LUCY  OF 
THE  STARS 


&<-&'&'&i>»-M;*£i-.i^ 


OR    PALMER 


bO 


LUCY   OF   THE   STARS 


BOOKS    BY    FREDERICK    PALMER 
PUBLISHED  BY  CHARLES  SCRIBNER'S  SONS 


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•   •   • 


Now  she  brought  the  horn  handle  of  the  crop  down  upon  the  vase 
with  all  the  strength  of  her  arm 


,   i'/i  ;?       '  ]  »-^— ;  


LUCY  OF  THE 
STARS 


BY 

FREDERICK   PALMER 


Illustrated  by   Jlonzo  Kimball 


CHARLES    SCRIBNER'S    SONS 
NEW    YORK  :::::::::  1906 


•  •  •  « 


Copyright,  1906,  by 
CHARLES   SCRIBNER'S  SONS 


Published,  April,  1906 


TROW   DIRECTORY 

PRINTING  AND   BOOKBINDING  COMPANY 

NEW  YORK 


"Yes,  you  would  bring  something  which  kings 
cannot  confer  or  millionaires  buy,  that  little  some- 
thing in  the  nature  which  is  lovable,  that  little  some- 
thing in  the  mind — found  only  in  a  woman's  mind 
— which  is  the  greatest  charm  of  the  universe. ' ' 


483507 


CONTENTS 


I.    The  Portrait  of  a  Lady  .     . 
II.    When  Arthur  Came     .     .     . 

III.  "What  a  Boy  You  Are!"     . 

IV.  The  Dowry  She  Brought 
V.    Amiable  to  the  End      .     .     . 

VI.    Craving  the   Hunter's  Strength 
VII.    Dispensing  with  Plato  .     .     . 

VIII.    Back  to  Earth 

IX.    Casting  Out  Fractions      .     . 

X.    No  Circles  for  the  Shore     . 

XI.    On  a  New  Footing  .... 

XII.    It  Becomes  a  Tale  of  Four  . 

XIII.  If  the  Pearls  Were  Real 

XIV.  Fanny   Belmore  by  Choice     . 
XV.    A  Moment  Without  the  Ghosts 

XVI.    Back  in  America 

vii 


PAGE 
I 

12 
26 

39 
48 

64 

78 

86 

92 

107 

123 

132 

144 

149 

157 

166 


Contents 

PAGE 

XVII. 

The  Love  of  the  People  .     .     . 

■      174 

XVIII. 

Two  Strong  Men  Meet    .     .     . 

.      182 

XIX. 

A  Dinner  at  Bender's 

'      193 

XX. 

Castles  and  a  Gothic  Girl  .     . 

202 

XXI. 

A  Soldier  from  the  Field    .     . 

2l6 

XXII. 

The  Courage  of  Leadership 

223 

XXIII. 

Not  a  Matter  of  Impulse    .     . 

234 

XXIV. 

Through  Another's  Eyes  .     .     . 

245 

XXV. 

Breaking  the  Circuit  .... 

257 

XXVI. 

For  Something  Real     .... 

268 

XXVII. 

A  Free  Day  in  the  Country    . 

279 

XXVIII. 

A    GoVERNOR-ELECr 

293 

XXIX. 

For  a  Single  Day 

310 

XXX. 

The  Lady  of  the  Portrait  .     . 

3H 

XXXI. 

The  Cabin  and  the  Girl      .     . 

327 

XXXII. 

Wormley  Calls 

339 

Vlll 


ILLUSTRATIONS 

Now  she  brought  the  horn  handle  of  the  crop 
down  upon  the  vase  with  all  the  strength 
of  her  arm Frontispiece 

FACING 
PAGE 

"It  is  like  a  fairy  tale,"  he  said.  "I  am  glad 
to  be  so  much  a  part  of  it  as  to  be  num- 
ber three " 46 

u  I  wanted  you  to  ask  that  question,"  Frane  re- 
plied    . 230 

Lucy  would    have    risen   then   even    if   Carniston 

had  not  come  to  claim  her  for  a  waltz       .   326 


IX 


Lucy  of  the  Stars 


THE   PORTRAIT   OF   A   LADY 

A  WORD,  a  glance,  the  smallest  thing  may  tell 
half  of  the  story.  From  the  half  to  the 
whole  there  is  the  difference  between  a  wireless 
which  may  still  be  ticking  out  its  call  when  the  ship 
goes  down  and  a  wireless  which  is  answered.  The 
shining  moments  of  this  work-a-day  world  come 
when,  in  joyous  interchange  of  signals,  word  is 
met  by  word,  or  glance  by  glance,  or  thought  by 
thought. 

Lucy's  shining  moment  came  with  a  telegram 
from  Arthur,  although  not  with  his  first,  in  which, 
from  Christiania,  he  announced  that  he  had  left 
Lord  Mordaunt's  yacht  and  was  about  to  return 
to  London.  As  she  slowly  tore  up  the  form  she 
wondered  why  this  should  concern  her.  Was  she 
his  agent,  to  meet  him  at  the  train  ?  His  butler,  to 
have  his  house  open  for  him  ? 

Outrunning  him  on  his  journey  came  a  letter: 
I 


Iaicj  of  the  Stars 


"My  hosts  are  very  lovable,"  he  wrote,  in  late 
August,  "and  nothing  is  quite  so  clear  as  that  they 
are  in  nowise  responsible  for  my  being  depressed 
and  bored.  I  consult  my  diary  and  find  that  to-day 
is  the  twenty-eighth,  and  we  left  on  the  fourteenth. 
Undeniably,  then,  I  have  been  only  two  weeks 
away.  Possibly  I  am  still  in  the  coma  of  some 
new  midsummer  disease  that  will  not  let  me  con- 
centrate my  mind  long  enough  to  read  even  a  novel 
through.  I  have  tried  three  and  finished  none. 
Two  weeks!     It  seems  two  months!" 

There  followed  a  page  and  more  about  people 
and  places.  This  part  Lucy  skimmed,  and,  return- 
ing to  the  study  of  the  sentences  quoted,  she  found 
them  one  moment  intelligible,  the  next  confusing. 

The  second  telegram,  which  came  only  a  few 
hours  after  the  letter,  dispelled  previous  doubts; 
filled  in  previous  lapses  with  sudden  comprehension. 

"I  have  found  out  the  cause  and  the  cure.  I 
have  something  to  tell  you.  Will  you  see  me  this 
afternoon,  please?" 

It  was  three  already.  He  would  come  at  four 
for  tea.  She  pressed  her  cheeks  with  her  finger- 
tips and  felt  them  burning.  Her  breath  came  in 
quick  gasps  as  she  thrilled  with  the  significance  of 
a  crisis — new,  strange,  delicious,  terrible. 

"I  must  think!  I  wouldn't  know  what  to  say 
or  do.    I  can't — I  can't  see  him  to-day !" 

Z 


The  Portrait  of  a  Lady- 
She  sprang  up,  rang  the  bell,  and  told  the  maid 
that  she  would  be  in  to  nobody  for  the  rest  of  the 
day.  Then  she  dropped  again  into  the  big  chair 
before  the  glow  of  the  low  fire — which  had  been 
laid  to  take  the  chill  out  of  the  room  in  early  Sep- 
tember— to  ponder  upon  herself  and  her  position. 
There  was  too  much  fear  for  the  future  for  her 
to  take  time  to  bemoan  what  was  lost.  Nothing 
now  could  alter  the  fact  that  when  she  and  Arthur 
met  again  it  would  be  as  two  new  beings.  Their 
old,  simple,  charming  comradeship  was  dead. 
What  was  to  take  its  place  ? 

Who  was  to  know  better  than  she,  with  her  ex- 
perience of  the  social  world,  that  the  son  of  an 
earl,  story-books  to  the  contrary  notwithstanding, 
does  not  seek  the  daughter  of  a  poor  foreign 
scholar  as  his  bride.  No  more  does  that  world 
generally  seek  acquaintances  in  the  old,  unfashion- 
able part  of  London  where  she  lived.  When  Dr. 
von  Kar  came  to  England,  eighteen  years  before, 
he  chose  the  house  which  he  had  since  occupied  for 
a  characteristic  reason.  It  was  even  then  a  relic 
of  days  of  more  air  and  less  gregariousness — this 
old  mansion,  which  is  still  set  in  an  oasis  of  green 
occupying  space  enough  for  half  a  dozen  villas. 

"I  am  within  hearing  of  the  roar  of  London, 
which  I  love,"  said  the  doctor,  with  that  German 
flattening  of  his  r's  and  French  lengthening  of  his  i's 

3 


Lucy  of  the  Stars 

which  made  his  tongue  as  cosmopolitan  as  his  mind. 
"That  roar  is  the  sound  of  the  surf  which  is  Eng- 
land's border,  and  of  her  individual  freedom  and 
strife.  At  the  same  time,  I  have  an  English  lawn 
between  my  gate  and  the  porch  and  an  English 
lawn  at  the  rear,  where  I  may  pace  up  and  down 
in  the  long  twilight  of  June  evenings." 

Later,  he  had  another  reason,  equally  in  keeping 
with  his  humour.  He  made  the  location  of  his 
house  a  test  of  friendship.  "Those  who  really  care 
for  me,"  he  said,  "will  come  here  as  readily  as  they 
would  go  to  the  West  End,  and  those  who  do 
not  care  for  me  I  do  not  want."  The  scholars  came 
primarily  on  account  of  his  scientific  achievements; 
but  they  also  came  partly,  and  some  friends  came 
solely,  because  he  had  that  rare  quality  of  being 
likeable  without  any  effort  on  his  part. 

Carriages  began  to  arrive  in  numbers  soon 
after  the  daughter  had  reached  womanhood. 
"You  know  that  old  German  doctor  man,"  to  use 
the  words  of  a  certain  lady  who  said  that  she  was 
the  discoverer  of  Lucy,  "the  one  with  the  grand 
manner  and  that  quaint  accent  which  is  so  much 
prettier  than  native  English  ?  He  is  a  great  friend 
of  old  Brent's.  They  write  pamphlets  about  bugs 
together — either  bugs  or  beetles;  I  am  not  quite 
sure  whether  they  are  the  same,  are  you  ? 

"His  little  girl,  at  all  events,  is  wonderful.  She 
4 


The  Portrait  of  a  Lady 

even  has  his  accent.  She's  hardly  pretty,  but  chic 
— oh,  so  chid  A  true  sprite  for  week-ends.  If 
you  have  Lucy,  you  can  invite  poets  and  M.  P.'s 
and  youth  and  crabbed  old  age,  too.  She  is  witty, 
she  is  a  mimic,  she  can  write  a  song  and  play  and 
sing  it  while  you  wait.  The  witch  must  be  in  her 
blood — which  is  all  Continental,  by  the  way. 
There  is  some  mystery  about  her.  I  have  heard  it 
whispered  that  she  comes  of  great  stock,  really, 
and  the  tenth  part  that  is  interesting  is  not  told. 
But  that  doesn't  matter  in  these  days,  unless  it 
comes  to  marrying  into  your  family.  Lucy  is  not 
of  that  order  at  all.  She  would  always  rather  walk 
with  two  men  than  with  one." 

It  would  have  been  inconceivable  to  the  world 
of  the  country-houses,  which  was  finding  her  less 
and  less  inclined  to  accept  their  invitations,  that  the 
Lucy  of  their  acquaintance  was  the  same  person  as 
this  relaxed  heap  of  nerves  and  muscles  gazing  ab- 
stractedly into  the  fire.  After  a  time,  she  rose  and 
went  into  the  book-walled  study,  which  was  empty, 
her  father  being  absent  in  the  city.  Resting  her 
hands  on  the  arm  of  his  chair,  she  leaned  forward, 
while  her  eyes  searched  with  staring  intensity  a 
small  pencil  drawing  of  a  woman's  face  above  his 
desk. 

The  portrait  had  always  hung  in  the  same  place 
since  the  dawn  of  Lucy's  memory,  which  was  a 

5 


Lucy  of  the  Stars 

year  or  two  after  they  came  to  London.  Above 
it  had  always  hung  a  carbine  and  a  battered 
slouch  hat.  Strangers  who  recognised  the  asso- 
ciation of  these  with  the  guerrillas  who  pestered 
von  Moltke's  lines  around  Paris  wanted  to  know 
if  the  doctor  had  been  a  German  soldier  and  had 
captured  the  owner.  Such  a  question  seemed 
always  to  breed  in  him  the  same  distant  and  sunny 
surprise  as  if  he  had  been  asked  if  he  were  at  the 
sacking  of  Troy. 

"On  the  contrary,  I  was  the  franc-tireur  myself," 
he  would  say,  without  further  explanation,  chang- 
ing the  subject  immediately  in  his  easy  way. 

As  a  result,  conclusions  were  drawn  that  he  had 
served  against  his  own  country.  Had  the  doctor 
heard  that  such  an  impression  was  abroad  he  would 
have  only  smiled. 

It  was  not  the  hat  and  the  carbine  which  inter- 
ested visitors  most,  however.  Only  the  timid  asked 
about  them.  The  bold  expressed  their  admiration 
of  the  portrait  in  such  a  way  as  to  make  the  hint 
of  their  curiosity  as  to  the  lady's  identity  a  ques- 
tion in  sense  if  not  in  form.  He  always  seemed 
to  rise  to  the  bait  most  delectably,  centering  his 
gaze  for  an  instant  on  the  lady  as  if  he  were  about 
to  tell  the  whole  story: 

"It  was  drawn  on  the  back  of  an  envelope,"  he 
would  say,  "and  it  shows  deftness  in  the  use  of 

6 


The  Portrait  of  a  Lady 

simple  lines,  certainly.  If  you  were  to  take  off  the 
frame  you  would  find  the  address  still  on  the  other 
side ;"  and  with  that,  smilingly  he  passed  to  another 
topic. 

He  never  said  more  in  connection  with  the  sub- 
ject of  the  portrait,  although  there  were  rare  occa- 
sions when,  following  the  mention  of  the  hat  and 
carbine,  his  eyes,  always  glowing  with  a  fine  and 
knowing  humour,  would  break  into  flame : 

"I  was  born  to  a  destiny  of  restlessness,"  he 
would  say  then;  "yes,  a  destiny  of  restlessness,  and 
here  I  have  been  in  one  house  in  London  all  these 
years.  When  I  was  young  I  conceived  myself  to  be 
living  in  the  age  of  knighthood.  I  set  out  to  right 
the  wrongs  of  the  world  with  the  sword.  Later, 
I  found  that  I  was  living  in  the  age  of  steam  and 
practical  politics,  and  to-day  I  am  a  working  chem- 
ist and  something  of  an  inventor." 

He  had  told  his  own  daughter  no  more  than  this. 
Yet  she  was  of  his  heart  and  of  his  life — if  his  old 
life  be  excluded.  The  barrier  was  where  the  old 
life  ended;  a  barrier  which  he  would  have  made 
artificially  as  complete  as  nature  makes  that  of  our 
pre-natal  existence.  That  he  was  not  an  exile  in 
fact  or  in  feeling  she  knew  by  their  Continental 
visits,  where  they  had  studied  and  played  together 
on  many  vacations  without  meeting  any  friends  or 
acquaintances  who  were   not  noticeably  the  out- 

7 


Lucy  of  the  Stars 

growth  of  his  new  life  and  his  scientific  achieve- 
ments. When  she  had  pleaded  with  him;  when 
she  had  coaxed;  when  she  had  demanded  as  a  right 
the  story  of  herself,  he  smiled  and  stroked  her  head. 
When  she  had  wept,  her  tears  had  brought  in  re- 
sponse only  tears  of  gentle  reproach  to  his  eyes. 

"Lucie,  dear,  am  I  such  a  bad  old  father?  Am 
I  not  content  with  you  and  with  things  as  they  are  ? 
Are  you  discontented  with  me?" 

"But " 

"When  you  say  'but'  to  things  which  are  and 
must  be,  you  pluck  the  sweetness  out  of  love,"  he 
would  say,  drawing  her  steadily  and  irresistibly  to 
him  in  his  arms.  It  was  then  that  she  felt  small 
and  helpless  and  wrong. 

To-day  for  the  first  time  she  was  angry  with 
him.  She  knew  that  he  had  robbed  her  of  some- 
thing which  could  never  be  replaced.  The  time 
had  come  when  she  must  and  would  know  the 
truth;  and  had  he  been  at  home  he  would  have 
met  a  new  Lucy — a  Lucy  in  a  storm  of  protest  over 
his  injustice. 

"If  I  were  as  beautiful  as  you  it  would  help." 
She  scowled  at  the  lady  of  the  portrait,  who  looked 
back  at  her  bewitchingly  and  coldly.  "All  you 
need  is  to  have  a  fine  gown  and  enter  a  drawing- 
room  and  your  victory  is  won.  I — I'm  French 
enough  to  use  my  wits,  so  that  the  world  won't  see 

8 


The  Portrait  of  a  Lady 

that  my  eyes  are  too  far  apart,  that  my  nose  is — 
what  will  you,  messieurs? — a  little  retrousse,  and 
my  chin — my  chin,  they  say  that  talks,  at  any  rate. 
I  did  not  care  much  before  if — if  I  was  Lucy  of  the 
stars.  My  father  was  enough;  his  arm  was 
around  me,  and  in  the  circle  of  his  protection  life 
was  full  and  deep  and  charming.  I  did  not  know 
that  I  was  ever  coming  out  of  the  chrysalis  like 
this.     I  do  care  now. 

"Do  you  know?"  she  asked.  "Is  it  possible  that 
you  are  my  mother,  you  who  are  so  different  from 
me?  If  not,  who  are  you — guarding  my  father's 
study  ever  since  I  can  remember — you  and  the  old 
hat  and  the  carbine?  If  you  are  not  my  mother, 
what  can  you  mean?    Oh,  what,  what!" 

She  dropped  into  her  father's  chair  and  buried 
her  face  in  her  hands.  Tears?  Yes,  from  Lucy, 
who  was  born  for  smiles.  When  she  arose  and 
went  back  to  the  chair  before  the  fire  in  the  other 
room,  Boze,  the  family  Great  Dane,  came  from  his 
position  before  the  grate  and  rested  his  head  on 
her  knee.  She  ran  her  finger  softly  backwards  be- 
tween his  eyes  and  smiled  a  little  through  her  tears ; 
for,  be  it  said  to  her  credit  or  discredit,  Lucy  could 
never  weep  long ;  which  is  not  saying  that  she  could 
not  suffer  for  long. 

"Boze,  there's  a  thing  sprung  into  my  heart  to- 
day— a  big,  glorious,  terrible  thing.     It's  odd  that 

9 


Lucy  of  the  Stars 

it  should  have  come  to  me.  I'm  an  odd  girl,  and 
this  is  an  odd  house,  and  everything  about  it  is  odd 
except  you,  old  dog.  You  are  perfectly  natural 
and  regular.     I  love  you  for  that. 

"It's  something,  Boze,  that  every  girl  expects 
that  she  will  find  some  day,  though  she  does  not 
think  of  it  in  that  way  except  in  the  very  back  of 
her  head — here  where  your  bump  is,  the  bump 
which  made  you  bury  your  first  bone  when  you 
were  a  puppy." 

Lucy  laughed  a  little,  as  she  often  did  when 
alone  at  her  own  quizzical  imageries. 

"To  me  this  marvel  is  like  finding  a  great  dia- 
mond in  the  street  when  you  are  poor  and  have  no 
right  to  anything  better  than  turquoises.  You  are 
nervous  with  the  wonder  and  joy  of  it.  You  fear 
that  you  will  lose  it;  you  fear  that  you  ought  to 
give  it  up.  You  expect  to  hear  people — to  hear 
those  who  have  admired  you  when  you  wore  tur- 
quoises— calling  out,  'What  is  she  doing  with  that 
great  diamond,  that  little  girl  from  nowhere  ?  She 
was  so  nice  in  turquoises.  Where  is  her  title? 
Where  is  her  pedigree?'  That  is  it,  Boze.  I  do 
not  want  to  give  up  the  diamond,  yet  I  must,  and 
live  on  the  thought  that  I  had  it  and  it  was  right- 
fully, rightfully  mine.  I  ought  never  to  see  him 
again.     I  ought  to  close  the  chapter  now,  I  ought, 

I  ought!    Oh,  I  don't  know— I— I " 

10 


The  Portrait  of  a  Lady 

Her  voice  died  into  a  whisper.  Through  the 
silence  of  the  house  came  from  without  the  clink- 
ing of  a  cab-horse's  feet  on  the  pavement  and  the 
cry  of  a  tradesman.  Then  she  heard  the  click  of 
the  garden  gate  and  a  step  on  the  flags  which  was 
not  her  father's,  and  yet  which  she  knew  almost 
as  well  as  she  knew  her  father's. 

Suddenly  all  that  she  had  thought  and  said 
seemed  ridiculous,  silly,  presumptuous.  Why 
should  she  think  that  he  had  come  to — she  avoided 
the  word  even  in  her  heart,  now.  Possibly  his  tele- 
gram meant  no  more  than  some  whim,  some  plan 
of  amusement  in  which  he  would  enlist  her  services. 
How  did  he  look?    What  had  he  to  say? 

She  outran  the  servant's  instructions  and  opened 
the  door  herself. 


II 


II 

WHEN   ARTHUR   CAME 

HAVING  at  the  age  of  twenty-nine  mortgaged 
all  the  property  which  his  father  had  left 
unattached,  Henry  Edward  Steadley,  sixth  Earl  of 
Carniston,  married  the  daughter  of  an  American 
plough  manufacturer.  "The  amiable  Carny  has 
turned  under  his  wild  oats  and  sowed  a  crop  of 
stocks  and  bonds,"  ran  the  saying  of  the  time. 
Lady  Carniston  had  died  at  the  birth  of  her  only 
child,  Arthur,  who  had  grown  to  manhood  with 
the  distinction  of  the  Steadley  countenance  softened 
by  her  own  dollish  good  looks. 

"There  are  a  good  many  mothers  of  marriage- 
able daughters" — if  we  may  quote  the  same  lady 
who  has  given  us  our  information  about  Lucy — 
"who  would  like  to  know  how  much  of  the  plough 
manufacturer's  fortune  is  left.  Arthur  is  very 
nice,  even  if  he  is  so  shy  and  prefers  to  spend  his 
time  with  professors  and  dreaming  by  the  sea. 
The  earl  has  leased  his  town-house  for  fifteen 
years  and  lives  modestly.  Some  think  that  this 
dandy  of  a  past  generation  has  turned  miser  as 

12 


When  Arthur  Came 

well  as  hermit ;  some  say  Monte  Carlo.  However, 
he  gives  his  son  a  good  allowance — possibly  be- 
cause it  keeps  him  away  from  home  and  he  is 
amazed  that  a  Steadley  should  have  done  well  at 
Oxford  instead  of  illy  at  the  card-table." 

After  he  left  the  university  Arthur  pursued  his 
bent  for  science,  which  brought  him  the  acquaint- 
ance of  Lord  Brent  and,  later,  of  Dr.  von  Kar 
and  Lucy.  Upon  his  first  appearance  before  a 
learned  society  the  members  received  him  with 
bland  consideration  owing  to  his  station.  They 
wished,  besides,  to  encourage  the  example  which 
he  was  setting  to  a  class  of  society  too  much  given 
to  yachts  and  horses  and  automobiling.  When  he 
had  finished  his  paper  the  earnestness  of  their  praise 
was  undeniable.  He  acknowledged  their  tribute 
with  a  blushing  and  girlish  bashfulness  which  is 
not  unbecoming  if  the  recipient  be  erect  and  ath- 
letic. This  characteristic,  entirely  contrary  to  all 
the  records  of  the  Steadley  nature,  was  doubtless  in- 
herited from  his  mother,  who  was  remembered  by 
the  few  who  knew  her  as  a  shy  girl  of  twenty,  a 
little  overcome  by  her  position. 

Never  had  Arthur  regretted  so  much  his  diffi- 
dence as  on  the  afternoon  when  he  stood  on  Dr. 
von  Kar's  doorstep,  having  come  straight  from 
Christiania.  His  plan  of  action  had  contemplated 
that  Lucy  would  receive  him  at  the  tea-table.    Her 

13 


Lucy  of  the  Stars 


sudden  appearance  when  she  herself  opened  the 
door  stunned  him  a  little  and  changed  the  lines  of 
the  play  without  previous  notice  to  one  of  the  actors. 
Lucy's  eyes  still  glistened  with  the  moisture  of  the 
tears  which  she  had  wiped  away;  she  had  never 
looked  more  lively  or  attractive. 

"Back  from  Norway  so  soon?''  she  exclaimed, 
with  a  questioning  pucker  of  her  eyebrows. 

"And  in  time  for  tea !"  His  answer  sounded 
flippant  and  hopelessly  inadequate  to  his  own  ears. 

Ten  minutes  later  nothing  but  commonplaces 
had  passed  between  them,  and  tea  had  been  brewed 
while  he  chatted  aimlessly  of  his  past  fortnight. 
He  realised  that  he  was  phonographic,  and  still 
he  talked  on.  If  only  she  would  give  him  an  open- 
ing, he  kept  thinking.  But  she  had  ceased  to  be 
sympathetic.  She  sat  at  the  table  volunteering  no 
remarks,  pretending  to  listen  when  she  could  not 
have  repeated  the  idea,  let  alone  the  detail,  of  what 
he  had  been  saying.  As  her  cup  in  one  hand  came 
in  touch  with  the  saucer  in  the  other,  she  felt  them 
beating  a  little  tattoo.  Did  he  hear  it?  she  asked 
herself,  as  she  suddenly  returned  both  to  the  table. 
Hardly.  He  had  just  caught  his  own  cup  and 
saucer  at  the  same  trick. 

Her  dream  of  the  way  the  thing  should  happen 
had  been  as  false  as  his.  Her  woman's  subtlety 
and  intuition  had  given  him  an  opportunity  with 

14 


When  Arthur   Came 

the  first  words  of  her  greeting.  A  man  who  went 
away  for  six  weeks  did  not  return  in  two  unless  he 
had  some  definite  object.  Hadn't  she  intimated  as 
much,  with  the  result  that  he  had  said  that  he  was 
in  time  for  tea  ?  Lucy  was  trying  to  keep  herself 
under  control ;  to  bring  herself  back  to  earth  from 
the  soarings  which  had  followed  her  receipt  of  his 
telegram. 

"I  am  talking  like  a  parrot!"  he  said  abruptly. 
"Does  all  this  interest  you?" 

"Immensely!"  she  said,  as  nonchalantly  as  if 
she  were  asking  him  whether  he  would  have  one 
lump  or  two.  Her  manner  made  him  fumble 
again. 

"It — it  isn't  interesting  to  me,"  he  said  plain- 
tively. 

"Really!"  she  rejoined  loftily.  "That  makes  it 
all  the  more  kind  of  you.  A  little  sacrifice  for  the 
entertainment  of  others  is  good  for  young  men, 
I've  heard  say." 

He  rolled  up  his  gloves  and  thrust  them  ab- 
sently in  his  cuff,  where  he  usually  carried  his 
handkerchief. 

"Lucy !"  He  uttered  her  name  as  if  it  were  the 
call  of  a  wounded  officer  for  first  aid  on  the  battle- 
field. 

"You  will  have  another  cup?"  she  asked. 

He  shook  his  head  vacantly.     "Lucy!"  he  re- 

15 


Lucy  of  the  Stars 

peated,  "nobody  else  is  coming  this  afternoon,  is 
there  ?" 

uMy  teas  are  not  R.  S.  V.  P.,  as  you  know,"  she 
rejoined. 

"Oh !"  was  all  he  could  say  to  that.  He  pulled 
at  his  little  moustache,  he  blushed;  and  he  was  very 
handsome,  as  she  had  always  thought.  uLucy — 
if  you  would  play  for  me  it — it  would  help !" 

She  lifted  her  brows  in  perplexity. 

"I  mean,  won't  you  please  play  for  me?"  he 
went  on. 

"That  is  always  a  good  plan  when  conversation 
is  running  low,"  she  said,  rising. 

Not  that  he  really  wanted  her  to  play.  He 
wanted  to  break  what  seemed  about  to  become  an 
endless  chain  of  mental  confusion.  Once  her  fin- 
gers were  running  over  the  keys  he  recovered  him- 
self. Suddenly,  without  warning — by  prehistoric 
male  right,  perhaps — he  reached  down  and  seized 
her  hands  in  his.  Her  hands  were  small  and  she 
was  small,  and  he  was  tall  and  masculine. 

"The  sum  of  it  all  is,  Lucy,  that  I  love  you," 
he  said.  "I  have  come  back  to  you  from  Norway, 
as  I  would  have  come  back  to  you  from  Peru  or 
Thibet  when  the  truth  found  me,  to  ask  you  to  be 
my  wife." 

Less  than  an  hour  before,  in  a  transport  of  im- 
agination, she  had  seen  him  in  the  same  attitude 

16 


When  Arthur  Came 

as  he  stood  now,  and  she  had  framed  an  answer. 
But  what  did  she  actually  say  when  the  time  came, 
this  Lucy? 

"Arthur,  it  is  not  becoming  to  you  to  get  so 
red!" 

Was  that  her  triumph  for  his  delay,  or  only  the 
inborn  mischief  of  her?  Of  this  we  are  at  least 
sure — it  was  like  her. 

He  did  not  frown  or  protest  at  her  flippancy. 
He  only  went  straight  on  in  manly  fashion. 

"It's  my  heart  trying  to  find  its  way  to  you,"  he 
said,  unconscious  of  any  gallantry,  of  anything  ex- 
cept the  truth.  "I  love  you,  Lucy.  All  I  have  I 
give,  and  for  all  I  lack  I  crave  your  forgiveness 
and  charity  and  help.    I  ask  you  to  be  my  wife." 

"You  love  me?"  she  said  softly. 

"Adorably!"  he  answered. 

She  bowed  her  head  a  little  lower.  "I  love  you, 
too — adorably,"  she  could  not  help  saying.  As  he 
released  her  hands  they  went  upward  to  him  and 
his  went  downward  to  draw  her  into  his  arms. 

She  was  the  first  to  break  the  bonds  of  their 
silence,  and  she  broke  them  with  a  little  sob  as  she 
drew  away  and  looked  at  him  with  the  steady  coun- 
sel of  a  new  familiarity,  her  hands  still  clasped  in 
his. 

"I  must  tell  you,"  she  said,  as  if  this  were  some 
sin  to  confess  in  order  to  clear  her  conscience,  "that 

17 


Lucy  of  the  Stars 

after  your  second  telegram  I  thought  that  you  were 
coming  to  say  this.  I  wanted  to  hear  you  say  it — 
oh,  that  has  been  very  sweet,  Arthur — and  I  was 
afraid  to  have  you  say  it,  after  all.  I  am  only  a 
girl,  not  a  goddess  of  wisdom.  I  am  proud  and 
happy  that  you  do  love  me  and  have  told  me  so, 
and,  Arthur " 

He  could  feel  in  her  finger-tips  the  tremour  that 
ran  through  her  as  she  bent  closer  to  him.  Then 
she  sprang  away. 

"You  sit  in  that  chair  and  I  will  sit  in  this  I"  she 
cried  imperatively.  "Our  hands  must  not  even 
touch.  That  fuses  us  and  makes  us  forget  that  we 
are  responsible  beings.  We  must  come  down  from 
the  stars  and  be  grave  and  brave  and  reasonable." 

Such  was  her  directness  and  the  authority  of  her 
charm  that  he  obeyed  instinctively. 

"Our  error,  dear  Arthur/'  she  said,  slowly  and 
insistently,  "is  that  we  forget  that  we  are  not  living 
in  a  world  composed  solely  of  you  and  me.  If 
there  weren't  any  other  world — no  world  of  an- 
cestry, no  living  world  around  us — if  I  were  cold 
enough  not  to  have  any  crotchets  in  my  head,  every- 
thing would  be  so — so  simple." 

Her  hand  was  stretched  toward  him  in  an  appeal- 
ing gesture.  He  went  to  her,  seized  it  in  his  own, 
and  sank  half  kneeling  beside  her. 

"I  have  learned  in  this  month's  absence  from  you 
18 


When  Arthur   Came 

that  there  is  no  world  except  that  of  you  and  me. 
Do  the  ancestors  concern  us?  They  are  dead.  If 
you  need  them,  there  are  enough  on  my  father's 
side  for  two.  If  you  are  in  awe  of  them,  why,  my 
mother's  father  began  life  as  a  blacksmith.  And 
the  living  world?  Let  that  smile  or  weep,  as  it 
pleases.  Even  if  I  did  not  love  you,  I  know  of  no 
girl  so  fit  to  be  a  countess  as  you !" 

"I  would  be  your  choice  as  a  countess  as  well  as 
a  wife?" 

"Yes." 

"You  tempt  me,  great  sir.  Might  I  whisper  in 
your  ear  that  I  have  seen  a  number  of  grand  dames 
who  were  not  gifted  with  wit,  wisdom,  or  the  art 
of  dress.  Sometimes  I  thought  that  if  I  had  their 
cards  and  their  position  I  might — well,  I  might 
play  the  game  almost  as  well  as  they." 

"You  shall  have  both  cards  and  position,"  he 
added. 

"You  being  the  ace  of  trumps,  with  a  long  suit 
and  a  double  ruff!"  She  caught  the  fever  of  the 
idea,  and  for  the  moment  was  veritably  the  Coun- 
tess of  Carniston.  "I  should  always  be  busy. 
There  is  nothing  I  hate  so  much  as  being  still.  I 
feel  like  a  plant,  then.  I  need  not  always  amuse 
others;  sometimes  others  would  amuse  me.  You 
could  let  yourself  out  and  allow  all  your  forces  to 
play.     A  place  all  secure — kind  to  our  servants, 

19 


Lucy  of  the  Stars 

just  to  our  tenants — not  only  playing,  but  making 
the  game  together !    That  is  it,  making  the  game !" 

Thus  she  carried  herself  to  a  pitch  of  excite- 
ment; and  then,  suddenly,  the  barrier  which  she 
could  build  as  rapidly  as  she  could  tear  it  down 
rose  between  her  and  her  vision  of  happiness. 
With  fresh  intensity  her  fear  of  the  unknowable 
enveloped  her. 

uThis  comes  of  letting  you  hold  my  hand,  wicked 
one!"  she  said,  drawing  away  from  him.  "You 
forget  that  we  are  to  be  grave  and  brave  and  rea- 
sonable. Now,  listen — no,  no  holding  of  hands! 
— to  the  story  of  this  Lucy  from  nowhere." 

She  told  him  all  that  her  father  had  told  her, 
and  how  her  father's  serenity,  his  strength,  his  art 
of  smiling  and  of  tearful  reproach,  and  her  own 
fears  of  spoiling  the  enchantment  of  their  happy 
existence,  had  kept  the  rest  from  her. 

"My  only  memory  is  of  this  house,  and  always 
that  portrait  has  hung  over  his  desk — that  beau- 
tiful woman,  always  young  while  my  father  grows 
old !  To-day  her  features  have  burned  themselves 
into  my  brain.  Come !  I  want  you  to  look  at  her 
and  help  me  lay  my  ghosts.  It  is  not  all  this — 
this  thing  itself  so  much  as  the  way  it  has  worked 
on  my  imagination  that  hurts,"  she  said,  as  they 
went  together  into  the  study. 

"Can  she  be  my  mother?"  she  asked,  after  Ar- 

20 


When  Arthur  Came 

thur  had  bent  close  to  the  portrait  and  studied  it 
sharply. 

He  told  himself  that  by  force  of  nature  this 
woman  might  have  been  the  vessel  which  once  held 
Lucy,  but  in  letting  the  child  go  her  selfishness  had 
parted  with  none  of  her  own  flesh  and  blood.  Be- 
fore he  spoke  he  smiled  in  the  manner  of  one 
who  closes  the  incident  of  humouring  another's 
vagaries. 

"I  don't  know,  dear,"  he  said.  "Furthermore, 
I  don't  care,  and  I  am  not  going  to  think  of  it 
again.  I'm  glad,  if  she  is  your  mother,  that  you 
don't  look  like  her." 

"Oh,  Arthur,  you  do  think  that!"  For,  natu- 
rally, Lucy's  regret  had  been  that  she  was  not  beau- 
tiful, not  realising  that  beauty  and  charm  do  not 
always  go  together,  and  of  the  two  charm  is  the 
more  enduring.  "Arthur,  it's  nice  of  you  to  say  so, 
and  still  nicer  of  you  to  believe  so.  Believing! 
That  is  everything,  isn't  it?" 

As  they  returned  to  the  other  room  he  was  lead- 
ing, and  for  the  time  being  the  ghosts  were  laid. 

"After  I  had  wired  you  that  I  was  coming  I 
received  a  telegram  from  my  father  saying  that 
he  wished  particularly  to  see  me,"  he  explained  at 
length.  "He  is  at  Burbridge.  As  soon  as  I  have 
seen  him  I  shall  return  to  town.  Then  for  our 
plans!" 

21 


Lucy  of  the  Stars 

"We've  been  too  full  of  our  happiness  for  such 
little  details,"  she  rejoined,  laughing. 

"And  we  will  be  married  soon?  Shall  it  be 
soon?" 

Could  she,  resting  in  his  arms,  say  him  no? 
Lost  in  the  joy  of  the  present,  the  living  moment, 
which  shut  out  all  yesterdays  and  all  to-morrows, 
she  answered : 

"Soon — very  soon." 

Dr.  von  Kar  had  an  engagement  for  the  eve- 
ning. When  Lucy  learned  at  dinner  that  it  was 
not  important,  she  pressed  him  to  remain  with  her 
and  send  a  note  in  excuse. 

"It's  such  a  chilly  evening,  father,  that  you  can 
imagine  you  have  a  cold,"  she  urged. 

"I  would  like  to,"  he  said.  "I  don't  see  much  of 
you,  Lucie  dear,  since  you  know  so  many  people. 
I  ought  really  to  go,  though." 

"I  want  you  to-night,"  she  pleaded.  "I'm  in  a 
mood  when  I  must  talk.    You  will  stay?" 

He  lifted  his  brows  at  her  strange  earnestness, 
regarded  her  thoughtfully,  and  then  consented. 

She  sparkled  in  thanking  him,  and  quickly  was 
the  Lucy  who  never  seemed  to  have  a  thought  that 
was  not  merry.  Through  the  meal  she  kept  him 
smiling,  mostly  by  her  accounts  of  the  people  she 
met  and  her  mimicry.    After  coffee,  when  he  had 

22 


When  Arthur  Came 

seated  himself  for  the  evening,  she  dropped  onto 
the  arm  of  his  big  chair. 

"Father,  I've  been  good  and  patient,  haven't  I? 
When  I  have  asked  you  to  tell  me  who  I  am,  you 
have  answered  by  bringing  my  love  into  question. 
It  did  not  occur  to  you  that  I  might  turn  the 
tables — I  might  bring  your  love  into  question  if 
you  refused  longer  to  tell  me  about  my  mother." 

Her  tone  told  him  that  this  was  a  mood  indeed, 
and  a  new  mood,  which  he  had  long  feared  might 
come.  He  was  quick  to  give  her  something,  lest 
she  might  demand  all. 

"I  will  tell  you  about  our  ancestry,"  he  said  eas- 
ily. "It  is  like  the  registry  of  foreign  legations, 
my  dear.  My  father  was  German  and  his  mother 
was  Russian.  My  mother  was  a  Frenchwoman — 
bless  her! — and  her  mother  was  English.  My 
father  died  when  I  was  young.  I  love  France, 
where  I  spent  my  youth.  When  the  Germans  were 
at  our  doors  I  fought  for  France  with  more  than 
the  ardour  of  a  Frenchman.  There  is  Italian 
blood,  too.  It  is  aristocratic,  as  is  the  Russian  and 
the  French,  while  the  German  belongs  to  burghers 
and  plodding  scholars.  Do  you  wonder  that  I  in- 
herited a  destiny  of  restlessness  or  you  a  talent  for 
languages  and  music?  Do  you  wonder  at  your 
cleverness,  Lucie?  Few  have  better  blood,"  he 
assured  her. 

23 


Lucy  of  the  Stars 


Talent  for  languages  or  for  music,  or  mere  clev- 
erness, meant  nothing  to  her  at  this  juncture  except 
exasperations  which  had  taken  her  into  a  world 
where  other  things  were  needed. 

"But  that  does  not  tell  me."  She  was  intense, 
almost  vehement.  "  Why  have  you  kept  that  por- 
trait over  your  desk  for  so  many  years  ?  Was  she 
my  mother?  Your  wife?  A  time  may  come — oh, 
I  don't  want  it  to,  but  it  may ! — when  my  love  will 
not  stand  secrecy." 

The  doctor  realised  that  a  crisis  was  at  hand. 
His  decision  was  quickly  made. 

"She  was  your  mother  in  honourable  marriage," 
he  said;  which  was  true. 

"And  where  is  she  now?"  she  demanded. 
"Where?" 

"She  is  dead."  This  was  not  true,  as  he  knew. 
Boldly  he  had  told  the  falsehood,  thinking  to  bring 
himself  peace  and  her  happiness. 

Lucy  drew  very  close  to  her  father.  She  had 
no  more  questions  to  ask,  as  she  told  him.  Only 
a  little  of  the  mystery  was  solved,  but  enough  for 
her.  The  strong  current  of  her  love  ran  back  to 
him,  bearing  with  it  overflowing  sympathy  for  that 
misfortune,  whatever  it  was,  that  had  sealed  his 
past. 

"This — this  and  something  else  makes  me  hap- 
24 


When  Arthur  Came 

pier  to-night  than  I  have  ever  been  before,"  she 
said. 

The  meaning  of  her  words,  which  he  dimly 
heard,  wholly  escaped  him.  He  was  enjoying  the 
relief  of  a  difficulty  passed,  and  his  recollection  was 
carrying  him  back  to  the  lady  of  the  portrait. 


25 


Ill 

"what  a  boy  you  are!" 

WHEN  there  is  no  one  in  the  big  seats  be- 
hind," said  Lucy,  "I'm  always  fearful 
that  the  rear  of  the  car  may  fall  off,  and  I'm 
always  looking  back  to  see  that  it's  still  fast." 

"Your  luggage  is  in  there,"  Arthur  observed. 

"Which  is  myself.  If  I  should  lose  that  I  could 
not  appear  for  dinner.  The  older  a  woman  grows 
the  more  she  depends  on  it,  till  by  and  by  she  is 
only  a  skeleton  and  the  luggage  is  the  flesh.  I  once 
met  an  American  millionairess  who  had  a  hundred 
and  seventy-five  boxes.  My  impression  was  that 
she  would  have  been  glad  to  have  kept  some  of 
the  flesh  in  the  boxes  and  saved  herself  lacing. 
One,  I  believe,  was  for  carrying  her  keys  and  an- 
other the  card-index  system  by  which  the  maids 
located  her  different  gowns.  The  maids  served  in 
shifts." 

This  nervous  chatter  of  Lucy's  was  only  to  carry 
on.  When  a  couple  have  a  hundred-and-thirty- 
mile  ride  before  them,  and  they  have  a  vital  secret 

26 


cc 


What  a  Boy  You  Are! 


to  discuss,  they  wait  till  they  are  out  of  the  crush 
of  the  cabs,  the  omnibuses  and  the  crowds. 

"I  like  it,"  Lucy  went  on,  "with  this  big  car  and 
only  ourselves.  There's  a  splendid  luxury  about 
it — especially  this  morning,  Arthur." 

Her  eyes,  her  chin,  her  mouth  smiled  at  him  in 
signal  of  their  understanding — the  understanding 
of  the  two  in  a  motor  which  was  crossing  Water- 
loo Bridge. 

uIn  a  runabout  you  feel  stuffy — as  if  you  were 
living  in  a  tiny  apartment,"  Lucy  continued. 
"When  two  are  in  a  big  car  and  going  twenty  miles 
an  hour,  with  the  back  seats  empty,  they  own  a 
town  and  a  country-house;  at  thirty  miles  an  hour 
they  have  added  a  shooting-box ;  at  forty,  they  have 
added  a  villa  on  the  Riviera ;  at  fifty,  you  feel  like 
a  flying  ghost  who  owns  the  world  and  wonders  if 
he  will  spin  off  into  space  at  the  next  turning  or 
arrive  at  his  ancestral  home  in  time  for  dinner. 
To  my  imagination  it  is  all  in  those  empty  seats. 
They  make  you  mighty.  How  could  anything  stop 
you  when  they  still  keep  on  coming  behind." 

He  had  a  deal  to  tell  her,  once  they  were  free  of 
the  traffic.  The  previous  night  she  had  received 
a  telegram  from  the  Earl  of  Carniston  himself,  ask- 
ing her  to  spend  a  day  and  a  night  at  Burbridge,  his 
country  seat.  Her  amazement  measurably  tem- 
pered her  elation.    As  her  father  was  at  the  house 

27 


Lucy  of  the  Stars 

when  Arthur  came  for  her,  there  had  been  no  time 
for  explanation  then.  When  they  passed  out  of  the 
suburbs  into  the  country,  and  he  gave  the  machine 
something  under  the  lawful  speed,  she  said : 

"That's  better  than  going  so  fast — better  than 
vain  things  like  villas  and  mansions  and  shooting. 
It's  intimate  and  confidential.  Come,  it  is  time  for 
the  chauffeur  to  talk." 

"You  were  a  little  surprised  at  such  quick  results, 
Lucy?"  he  asked,  proudly.  "There's  even  more 
and  better  news  than  you  could  have  imagined. 
What  will  you  say  when  I  tell  you  that  my  father 
knows  that  we  are  engaged?" 

"And  he  sent  for  me  after  that !  Really !"  She 
would  not  allow  herself  fully  to  credit  the  state- 
ment while  it  was  still  unqualified. 

"Yes.  I  don't  know  what  it  was  that  my  father 
wanted  to  see  me  particularly  about,  I'm  sure. 
Three  or  four  times  in  the  last  year  he  has  sent 
for  me.  I  never  knew  him  to  do  that  before.  On 
each  occasion  he  said  that  we  must  have  a  talk 
after  dinner  or  to-morrow  morning,  and  somehow 
he  never  came  to  the  point.  The  most  that  he  ever 
said  was  that  I  was  twenty-seven  years  old  and 
pretty  soon  I  would  have  to  settle  down.  On 
Thursday  we  had  some  Americans  at  the  house — a 
Miss  Hodges  and  a  Mr.  and  Mrs.  Belmore.  Miss 
Hodges  is  a  stunning  girl  of  a  type.     Immensely 

28 


"What  a  Boy  You  Are!" 

rich;  a  good  catch  for  some  poor  chap,  I  should 
say.  I  don't  know  just  what  to  make  of  her.  The 
Belmores  are  delightful — the  kind  of  Americans 
who  are  certain  of  themselves,  and  seem  to  like 
their  own  way  and  their  own  country  too  well  to 
think  of  changing,  and  yet  not  in  the  slightest  de- 
gree aggressive.  An  American  politician  by  the 
name  of  John  Frane  was  along  also.  A  decidedly 
clever  man,  I  should  say — one  of  those  electric 
Americans — strong  and  outspoken.  I  liked  him. 
He  worships  Miss  Hodges,  and  Miss  Hodges  is 
learning  to  like  castles.  I'll  be  interested  to  know 
what  comes  of " 

"Arthur,"  she  interrupted  in  vexation,  "let  us 
pass  over  the  discovery  of  America.  What  I  am 
dying  to  know  is  why  your  father  invited  me." 

"Yes,  the  Belmores  and  Miss  Hodges  don't  have 
much  to  do  with  that." 

"Not  unless  your  father  wants  you  to  marry 
Miss  Hodges,"  she  put  in.  "Most  fathers  want 
their  sons  to  marry  rich  girls." 

"If  he  does,  he's  changed  his  mind.  After  they 
had  gone  yesterday  he  did  ask  me  how  I  liked  her. 
It  was  then  that  I  found  my  tongue.  I  was  full 
of  you  after  being  with  those  people  for  two 
days " 

"You  were,  Arthur — you  were,  just  the  same?" 
she  asked  intently. 

29 


Lucy  of  the  Stars 

"The  loneliest  man  in  England!  So  I  told  him 
that  I  loved  you  and  was  going  to  marry  you,  quite 
as  if  the  whole  thing  was  arranged  and  nothing 
could  stop  me." 

"Bravo!"  She  liked  his  courage.  "And  what 
did  he  say?  I'll  not  break  into  song  till  I  hear 
that." 

"My  father  does  not  talk  much.  You  can  never 
tell  his  thoughts  by  his  face.  He  is  most  imper- 
sonal. As  a  father  he  is  a  mate  for  yours,  in  that 
respect.  Precisely  what  he  did  was  to  whistle. 
Then  he  went  over  to  the  table  and  lighted  a  cigar- 
ette and  stood  with  his  back  to  the  grate,  smiling 
at  me  as  if  I  were  something  new  and  rather 
pleasing. 

"  'I  remember  her,'  he  said.  'She  plays  bil- 
liards well  for  a  woman,  and  she  mimicked  old 
Gracey  perfectly.  What  a  boy  you  are!  How 
long  has  this  been  going  on?' 

"Then  I  told  him  everything,  and  why  I  had 
come  back.  He  listened  attentively,  his  features 
working  in  a  strange  way. 

"  'It's  your  affair,  not  mine,  I  see,'  he  said,  still 
smiling  beatifically.  'I  have  never  believed  that 
marriages  made  in  heaven  were  exempt  from  catas- 
trophes; nor  has  my  scepticism  on  that  point  ever 
affected  my  opinion  of  those  which  are  strictly 
earthy.     She  would  make  a  very  charming  count- 

30 


"What  a  Boy  You  Are!" 

ess,  I  am  sure.  While  we  don't  want  to  boil,  of 
course,  still  we  need  the  effervescence  of  an  occa- 
sional clever  woman  among  the  peeresses.  It's  a 
sacrifice  one  should  make  for  the  good  of  the  caste, 
I  suppose. 

"  'What  a  boy  you  are !"  he  said  again,  after  a 
pause.  'To  think  of  you  twenty-seven  years  old — 
and  a  Steadley,  too !     It's  beautiful,  I  must  say.'  " 

"Those  were  his  exact  words?"  Lucy  asked 
keenly. 

"Yes." 

"You  say  he  smiled  when  he  said  it?" 

"All  the  while,  after  that  first  whistle." 

Lucy  made  a  grimace  of  perplexity. 

"What  is  your  father's  method  ?  Is  he  cynical  ?" 
she  asked. 

"No,  I  can't  say  that  he  is.  To  tell  the  truth, 
now  you've  put  it  that  way,  it  doesn't  seem  to  me 
as  if  I  knew  my  father,  except  he's  always  amiable 
— 'the  amiable  Carniston,'  they  call  him."  Arthur 
hastened  on  with  his  story.  "Then  he  suggested 
that  he  ought  to  know  you  better,  and  himself 
wrote  the  telegram  which  you  received.  That  is 
all.    Hasn't  it  worked  out  wonderfully?" 

"Yes,"  Lucy  admitted.  Where  he  saw  clearly 
she  was  in  doubt.  She  was  going  to  an  uncertainty 
which  seemed  worse  to  such  a  nature  as  hers  than 
the  anticipation  of  downright  opposition. 

31 


Lucy  of  the  Stars 

"Lucy,  you  are  sad  and  it's  a  triumph.  I  don't 
understand." 

"No,  I'm  trying  to  take  it  all  in.  It  seems  as  if 
we  were  in  fairyland  and  I  was  waiting  to  wake 
up,"  she  said  dubiously. 

"I  understand.  It's  because  you  don't  ap- 
preciate yourself.  He  has  seen  you  once  and 
felt  your  charm.  That  has  opened  the  door  of 
opportunity.  All  you  have  to  do  is  to  make  him 
captive  as  you  have  me,  which  you  will  do  to-night. 
You  must  be  in  your  best  form." 

"Which  means  that  I  must  be  the  play-actress." 

"No,  not  at  all." 

"I  myself  being  a  play-actress — is  that  it?"  she 
said,  with  a  moue. 

He  frowned  slightly.  "You  don't  mean,"  he 
said,  "that  you  don't  want  to  appear  at  your  best 
— not  for  me — not  for  our  cause?" 

"I  do !  I  will !  I'm  only  awed  at  the  prospect 
of  such  a  test.    It's  the  test  of  my  life,  Arthur." 

Though  she  smiled,  it  was  as  one  who  muses. 
At  the  inn  where  they  made  a  long  hour  for  lunch- 
eon, she  asked  him  many  questions  about  his 
father's  nature  and  habits. 

"Studying  my  part!"  she  interjected.  "It's 
going  to  be  an  ordeal  for  me,  Arthur,  and  you  must 
help.  Let's  arrive  a  little  late,  so  I  shall  have  no 
time  to  talk  to  him  before  dinner." 

32 


"What  a  Boy  You  Are!" 

Accordingly,  he  regulated  the  speed  of  the  ma- 
chine to  that  end,  and  it  was  dusk  when  they 
reached  Burbridge,  where  she  was  met  on  the  land- 
ing by  Mrs.  Ormley,  an  elder  sister  of  the  earl, 
who  was  visiting  her  brother.  Mrs.  Ormley  was 
a  partial  invalid,  who  made  a  good  deal  of  the  fact. 
On  the  plea  of  indisposition  she  asked  Lucy  to  ex- 
cuse her  from  going  to  dinner. 

When  Lucy  came  downstairs  half  an  hour  later, 
Arthur  met  her  in  the  hall. 

"If  there  are  rocks  ahead  or  the  current  is  swift, 
look  across  the  table  and  encourage  me,"  she 
begged.  "It's  much  more  difficult  than  appearing 
in  a  play,  you  know.  There  you  have  to  feel  your 
part ;  here  I  am  the  part.  And,  Arthur,  how  do  I 
look?" 

"Divine!" 

"You  are  staring  straight  into  my  eyes.  I  don't 
mean  my  face;  I  mean  my  gown." 

"Divine!"  he  repeated,  with  a  sweeping  glance 
at  the  gown  and  a  longer  look  into  her  eyes  again. 
"You'll  carry  it  through.  If  you  are  on  the  wrong 
tack  I'll  put  some  salt  on  my  plate.  You'll  carry 
it  through,  though;  you  won't  have  stage  fright. 
You're  always  splendid."  He  caught  her  hands 
in  his  and  the  kiss  was  sweet  to  her;  for  she  was 
not  certain  that  after  the  interview  with  his  father 
she  might,  with  propriety,  have  another. 

33 


Lucy  of  the  Stars 

"I  haven't  forgotten  that  game  of  billiards," 
were  the  earl's  first  words,  "or  the  way  you  imi- 
tated old  Gracey  when  he  missed  a  shot.  On  my 
word,  he  is  the  most  stupendous  bore  I  ever  played 
with." 

"I'll  try  you  another  game  after  dinner,"  she 
rejoined  brightly,  "if  you  will  give  me  forty." 

"As  I  remember  your  playing,  that  is  rather  big- 
gish odds.     However,  I  will  take  you  on." 

Carniston  had  not  meant  to  be  quite  so  affable. 
Lucy's  slightness,  her  grace,  the  memory  of  her 
charm  on  another  occasion,  had  inevitably  made 
her  appearance  pleasant  to  him. 

"From  my  window  upstairs  I  saw  you  arrive," 
he  said.  "I  didn't  come  to  the  door  because  I  know 
how  stiff  and  sticky  one  feels  when  he  gets  out  of 
the  motor-car.  He  does  not  want  to  parley  at  all, 
but  to  go  straight  to  the  tub." 

"That's  why  we  were  late.  I  mean,  I  thought 
I  would  like  to  meet  you  first  at  dinner,"  Lucy  said 
impulsively;  and  then  she  looked  at  Arthur's  salt, 
but  he  was  not  taking  any. 

"Yes,  in  these  days  young  women  come  to  our 
doors  looking  like  Polar  bears  who  have  been  hav- 
ing a  dust  bath.  They  go  upstairs,  and  when  they 
come  down  they  are  out  of  the  chrysalis.  It's  quite 
magical.  We  are  going  a  new  and  fast  pace,  and 
it's  far  from  me  to  disapprove  because  I'm  old. 

34 


"What  a  Boy  You  Are!" 

It's  good  that  women  don't  faint  any  more,  and 
I  don't  mind  their  smoking  cigarettes  instead 
of  carrying  smelling-salts,  if  they  will.  But  I  do 
hope  that  we  shall  never  come  to  dining  in  tennis 
flannels.  Women  should  combine  to  keep  the  din- 
ner hour  sacred  to  feminine  charm." 

"So  say  I !"  said  Lucy.  She  realised  that  she 
was  chattering. 

"To  tell  a  secret  out  of  freemasonry,  a  woman 
likes  the  contrast.  If  she  has  been  admired  by 
day  for  the  way  that  she  has  ridden  or  played 
tennis,  she  never  forgets  that  she  has  the  evening 
in  which  to  show  another  side  of  her  character. 
I  don't  think  that  you  need  ever  worry  that  the 
dinner  fetish  will  be  disturbed.  Sex  requires  that ; 
and,  after  all,  we  are  women,  as  every  one  of  us 
realises  at  the  sight  of  either  a  Worth  gown  or 
a  mouse." 

Arthur  was  going  without  salt  for  fear  that  he 
might  interfere  with  her  famous  progress.  How- 
ever, it  seemed  to  her  that  it  was  now  the  earl's  turn 
to  talk.  She  had  been  in  many  great  houses,  but 
this  was  the  first  time  that  she  had  ever  sat  at  the 
head  of  the  table  as  if  she  were  the  mistress  of  one; 
and  she  suddenly  felt  the  enormity  of  this  fact. 
In  one  of  those  glances  when  the  mind  sums  up 
the  eye's  message  as  quickly  as  the  eye  receives  an 
image,  she  took  stock  of  the  room  with  its  high 

35 


Lucy  of  the   Stars 

ceiling  and  heavy  carvings.  The  effect  was  that 
of  the  chase  and  of  war.  Originally,  everything 
in  the  room  had  conformed  to  the  heads  of  the 
wild  animals  which  were  mounted  here. 

In  this  flash  of  comprehension  she  had  a  better 
glimpse  of  Carniston;  such  comprehension  as  one 
often  gets  swiftly  by  the  soft  light  of  a  dinner- 
table.  His  gaunt,  wrinkled  features  would  have 
expressed  pure  boredom  if  it  had  not  been  for 
the  way  that  he  combed  his  moustache  upward. 
It  was  a  face  belonging  to  the  city,  although  he 
had  lived  so  much  in  the  country;  of  a  man  who 
rides  hard  not  for  riding's  sake,  but  in  order  that 
he  may  have  a  better  palate  for  his  port.  The  chin 
was  noticeably  weak;  the  eyes  were  the  best  feat- 
ure. They  were  still  young  and  bright  and  in- 
finitely sweet-tempered.  The  ease  with  which  they 
would  win  forgiveness  might  well  have  destroyed 
all  sense  of  discipline  in  the  character  of  their 
owner.  These  eyes  now  looked  up  at  Lucy,  twink- 
ling with  amusement,  as  if  they  expected  her  to  go 
on  speaking. 

"I  am  little  acquainted  with  Burbridge,"  she 
said.  "I've  had  a  glance  at  all  the  tusks  and  fangs 
which  look  down  on  us.    Who  killed  them?" 

"The  fourth  earl,  my  grandfather,  was  a  great 
hunter.  He  finally  lost  his  life  in  a  fight  with  a 
lion.     A  Kocky  Mountain  sheep  looks  across  to 

36 


"What  a  Boy  You  Are!" 

a  snow  leopard  from  the  Himalayas,  you  see;  an 
American  bison  to  a  Cape  buffalo.  It  was  the  third 
earl  who  took  the  Indian  trophies  under  Wellesley. 
They  hung  in  the  hall  upstairs  for  a  long  time  until 
we  brought  them  here,  so  that  we  should  have  the 
hunter's  and  the  warrior's  things  together.  Every 
Steadley  has  had  his  bent.  Your  own  room,  you 
noticed,  was  furnished  entirely  in  Louis  Quatorze. 
The  second  earl  was  more  of  a  Frenchman  than  an 
Englishman.  Arthur's  bent,  as  you  know,  is  sci- 
ence. Eventually,  if  the  house  lasts  long  enough, 
we  shall  have  every  department  of  human  activity 
represented." 

"You  will  have  to  add  wings  to  Burbridge  to 
make  room  for  the  relics." 

"That  I  think  we  shall  leave  until  another  finan- 
cier comes  into  the  family,"  he  rejoined.  "The 
hunter  had  the  gift  of  making  wise  investments. 
Burbridge  is  to-day  much  as  he  left  it.  In  his 
changes  he  pleased  himself  without  too  much  re- 
gard for  what  had  gone  before.  The  founder  of 
the  family  had  not  more  distinctly  the  headstrong 
qualities  of  the  progenitor  than  he." 

"And  your  own  bent,  my  lord?" 

If  he  had  one  she  ought  to  have  known  it.  She 
had  made  a  mistake,  she  realised,  before  she  saw 
Lord  Carniston  flush  or  Arthur  half  emptying  his 
salt-cellar  onto  his  plate. 

37 


Lucy  of  the  Stars 

"My  friends  in  younger  days,"  he  answered, 
"said  that  it  was  too  much  affability."  There  was 
a  catch  in  his  voice.  "I  fear  that  age  has  made 
my  bent  futility." 

"One  who  has  a  bent  may  indulge  himself  with- 
out being  of  service  to  others,"  she  put  in  hastily. 
"The  life  of  no  British  peer  who  lives  on  his  estate 
and  looks  after  his  tenants  is  futile." 

He  laughed  sceptically,  almost  harshly. 

"That  brings  us  to  a  new  development  in  the  his- 
tory of  the  Steadleys,"  he  said  sternly,  "for  Arthur 
has  told  me  your  secret.    Presently " 

"Now  for  the  sting  under  his  smile.  I  knew  that 
it  was  coming,"  Lucy  thought.  "We  shall  have  it 
as  soon  as  the  coffee  is  served  and  the  servants  are 
out  of  the  way." 


38 


IV 

THE   DOWRY  SHE  BROUGHT 

LIKE  most  men,  the  earl  knew  his  own  weak- 
nesses well  enough  to  imagine  an  allusion 
to  them  when  none  was  intended.  No  matter  what 
the  distance  he  had  to  travel  or  the  number  of  toll- 
gates  he  had  to  pass,  he  would  choose  the  sunniest 
route  around  an  obstacle  rather  than  surmount  it. 
He  had  a  purpose  in  bringing  Lucy  to  Burbridge, 
but  the  development  of  his  hazy  plan  for  accom- 
plishing it  was  left  to  the  inspiration  of  the 
moment. 

By  asking  what  his  bent  was  she  had  reminded 
him  of  how  gracefully  she  was  making  him  the 
victim  of  it.  His  "presently"  was  spoken  with  a 
determination,  not  to  impress  his  hearers,  but  to 
reassure  himself  that  he  would  no  longer  allow  his 
amiability  to  compromise  his  sense  of  duty  once  the 
three  were  assured  of  seclusion  from  eavesdrop- 
ping. To  Lucy  it  was  in  the  nature  of  a  challenge. 
Arthur  saw  that  he  had  been  too  optimistic.  He 
scowled  irritably.     Lucy  became  unnaturally  bril- 

39 


Lucy  of  the  Stars 

liant.  She  held  the  reins  of  conversation  with  a 
merry  whip-hand  till  coffee  was  brought. 

Then  the  room  became  oppressively  silent,  while 
she  looked  across  to  the  earl,  saying,  with  her  eyes, 
that  now  was  his  time  to  be  severe  if  he  would 
break  a  girl's  heart.  His  resolution  was  already 
faltering;  he  was  again  looking  for  a  way  around 
the  obstacle,  or,  at  least,  a  better  path. 

"I  fancy  that  you  two  have  no  secrets  apart,"  he 
said  vaguely.  "So  Arthur  must  have  told  you  my 
answer  when  he  surprised  me  with  the  news  of  your 
— your  engagement." 

"Precisely,  our  engagement,"  said  Arthur 
tartly.     "I  told  her  every  word." 

"And  I  studied  every  word,"  Lucy  put  in  de- 
voutly, "for  I  knew  that  our  fate  lay  with  your 
wisdom  and  kindness.  I  tried  to  be  wise  and  hon- 
est myself.  Has  Arthur  told  you  what  I  said  when 
he  proposed?" 

"No,"  Arthur  intervened.  "It  seemed  beside 
the  point.  She  was  going  to  refuse.  She  asked 
me  to  consider  the  difference  between  our  posi- 
tions." 

"Which  made  her  all  the  more  charming," 
added  the  earl.  He  did  not  see  the  flash  of  fire  in 
Lucy's  eyes,  because  he  was  bending  over  to  knock 
the  ashes  off  his  cigar. 

"I  brushed  aside  her  objections,"  Arthur  went 
40 


The  Dowry  She  Brought 

on.  "They  might  have  meant  something  to  the 
world,  but  they  meant  nothing  to  me.  I  bring  her 
this  estate  and  a  title,  and  she  brings  me  something 
greater  than  either." 

The  earl  looked  admiringly  at  Arthur,  whose 
earnestness  made  him  the  more  handsome. 

"Far  greater!''  he  said  agreeably.  "I  can  have 
no  doubt  of  that.  The  living  proof  is  before  me." 
He  smiled  across  to  Lucy.  She  blushed  and  then 
looked  at  him  mischievously. 

"By  way  of  introduction — "  she  said,  striking 
home  to  the  difficulty  he  was  having  to  express 
the  thing  he  had  started  to  say. 

"When  you  first  told  me  of  your  romance  I 
didn't  act  like  the  heavy  father  in  the  Drury  Lane 
melodramas,  did  I?"  he  asked,  almost  apologeti- 
cally. 

"Most  fitly  and  respectably,"  Arthur  said,  laugh- 
ingly. He  was  certain  now  that  his  father  was 
coming  round. 

"It  has  been  a  most  happy  evening  for  me,"  said 
the  earl.  "I  am  looking  forward  to  that  game  of 
billiards — and  I  know  of  nothing,  my  dear  girl, 
that  would  please  me  more  than  to  have  you  here 
every  night  for  dinner.  Too  often  I  sit  alone.  I 
love  light  and  cheer  and  wit.  These  you  would 
bring  to  Burbridge,  and  with  them  ten  added  years 
to  my  life.    Yes,  you  would  bring  something  which 

4i 


Lucy  of  the  Stars 

kings  cannot  confer  or  millionaires  buy,  that  little 
something  in  the  nature  which  is  lovable,  that  little 
something  in  the  mind — found  only  in  a  woman's 
mind — which  is  the  greatest  charm  of  the  universe. 
He  who  would  take  that  out  of  your  nature  and 
that  out  of  your  mind — and  they  are  very  fragile 
things — would  be  a  murderer.  They  come  with 
a  free  existence  among  charming  friends.  Arthur, 
who  is  young  and  a  bit  socialistic — even  he  does  not 
realise  yet  what  the  position  which  he  is  coming 
into  means.  Its  limitations  might  stifle  one  of  your 
fine  spirit,  Lucy.  Such  ambitions  may  well  be  left 
to  stupid  women." 

"It  is  not  that  I  want  to  be  Countess  of  Carnis- 
ton!"  Lucy  said,  hotly.  "It  is  that  I  want  to  be 
Arthur's  wife."  She  fairly  hated  the  earl  at  that 
moment.  He  had  been  playing  with  her  as  a  cat 
plays  with  a  mouse,  she  thought;  he  had  chosen 
the  crudest  way  of  saying  no  to  a  girl  of  her  spirit. 
"I've  only  known  him  as  Arthur.  What  is  this 
thing  of  being  a  countess  beside  being  myself!"  she 
continued. 

"True,  true,"  the  earl  interjected.  He  was 
already  asking  her  pardon  with  those  eyes  which 
had  been  the  source  of  forgiveness  from  his  nurse 
as  a  child  and  from  his  friends  and  creditors  as  a 
man. 

Her  anger  ebbed  away.  She  caught  herself 
42 


The  Dowry  She  Brought 

thinking  how  he  had  striven  to  be  kind,  according 
to  the  lights  of  an  old  nobleman,  when  consider- 
ing the  daughter  of  a  poor  scholar  as  a  possible 
daughter-in-law. 

"If  he  becomes  earl,  can  I  help  that?"  she  asked. 
"I  must  accept  it  in  the  same  way  that  I  do  the  fact 
that  my  father  is  German  and  my  mother  was 
French,  or  that  I  number  French  and  Italian 
nobility  among  my  ancestry."  Lucy  could  not 
resist  this  allusion,  although  she  realised  that  it 
was  priggish  and  sounded  like  Walter  Scott. 

"If  it  is  a  question  of  blood  and  breeding,"  said 
Carniston,  "you  have  the  true  flavour  of  both — 
which  is  something  else  that  kings  cannot  grant  nor 
millionaires  buy.  You  do,  indeed,  bring  us  a  dowry 
there." 

"If  Arthur  loses  a  leg  or  goes  blind,"  she  con- 
tinued, in  her  fervour,  "if  he  goes  bad  or  becomes  a 
duke,  he  is  still  my  Arthur.  That  is  it.  That  is  all. 
I  confess  myself  to  you  so  that  you  shall  understand 
and  Arthur  shall  not  forget." 

"And  I  am  the  crabbed  father  who  spoils  the 
romance?"  he  said,  regretfully. 

"Not  yet !  No.  We  hope  to  make  you  a  part 
of  it.  We  hope  to  give  you  the  added  ten  years  of 
life.  If  we  cannot — if  we  cannot,  why,  then,  fate 
is  fate."    Lucy  bowed  her  head. 

The    earl  moved   uneasily    in  his   seat,   while 

43 


Lucy  of  the  Stars 

Arthur,  suffering  to  see  Lucy  put  on  trial  in  this 
way,  burst  out : 

"And  if  we  cannot,  it  takes  only  two,  my  lord, 
to  make  our  kind  of  a  bargain." 

Lucy  now  wished  that  her  own  salt-cellar  had 
not  been  removed  from  the  table.  She  tried  in 
vain  to  reach  Arthur  with  the  toe  of  her  boot. 
Carniston  drew  back  as  if  his  son  had  struck  him 
a  blow. 

"Of  course,  Arthur,  you  can  do  that,"  he  said 
reproachfully. 

"But  it  does  take  two,"  Lucy  put  in.  "You  are, 
Arthur,  still  only  one.  Dear  Lord  Carniston,  we 
want  your  consent." 

"My  father  speaks  in  riddles,"  said  Arthur  im- 
patiently.   "And  you — what  do  you  mean,  Lucy?" 

"That  I  love  you."  She  reached  across  the  table. 
Arthur's  hand  went  to  hers  slowly,  but  the  clasp 
was  ardent  enough. 

"You  wish-to  say,  my  lord" — here  Lucy  in  man- 
ner and  tone  was  at  her  best — "that  although  I  am, 
as  you  say,  possessed  of  something  in  mind  and 
something  in  nature  which  are  the  glory  of  the  uni- 
verse, yet  I — I  will  not  quite  do  for  a  countess." 

"I  mean  that  you  would  make  the  most  charm- 
ing countess  in  England,"  he  said  hastily,  in  some 
embarrassment. 

"You,  a  peer  of  England,  then,  would  rob  Eng- 
44 


The  Dowry  She  Brought 

land  for — for  my  sake !"  Her  laugh  called  for  the 
laugh  with  which  he  answered  her  sally. 

"Suppose  you  were  a  poor  countess,"  he  said 
helplessly.  "Suppose  that  all  my  lands  were  mort- 
gaged to  the  last  sovereign.  Suppose  that  you  had 
to  count  pennies  and  you  could  not  afford  to  enter- 
tain or  be  entertained." 

"Then  we  should  clean  house;  we  should  econo- 
mise; we  should  work;  we  should  try  to  bring 
back  prosperity.  I  had  not  asked  about  that  or 
thought  about  it.  I  have  thought  only  of  Arthur. 
He  came  into  my  life,  and  I  have  to  go  with  him 
and  he  with  me."  She  bowed  her  head.  Carnis- 
ton  rolled  the  ashes  off  his  cigar  on  the  edge  of 
his  coffee-cup.  She  looked  up  again,  half  appeal- 
ingly,  half  mischievously.  "One  likes  a  little  risk. 
It  takes  the  perplexity  out  of  life,  as  music  does. 
Sometimes  I  go  to  the  piano  and  sing  any  verses 
that  come  into  my  head,  and  I  find  they  help. 
Never-care  songs  I  call  them.  There's  one  that 
runs: 

•«  'If  you  have  a  heart  afraid  to  play  the  game, 

Then  that  heart  was  meant  for  hanging  in  a  frame; 

Never  care,  never  care! 
Then,  dear  nurse,  that  kind  provision  is  the  best 
Which  will  never  put  your  darling  to  a  test — 

Never  care,  never  care!'  " 

Her  manner  of  speaking  the  lines  softened  their 
45 


Lucy  of  the  Stars 

quizzical  audacity.  The  earl  liked  to  hear  such  a 
spirit  expressed  in  that  room  under  the  heads  which 
the  hunter  earl  had  killed — a  spirit  that  had  been 
missing  in  this  family  for  two  generations. 

"Nor  must  we  forget,"  Lucy  continued,  uthe 
added  ten  years.  Arthur  and  I  together  want  to 
see  you  enjoy  them." 

The  earl  sought  in  vain  for  further  argument. 
He  himself  had  granted  the  premises  on  which  he 
had  been  beaten. 

"Is  it  yes,  father?"  Arthur  asked. 

"Is  it  yes?"  Lucy  asked  softly,  bending  toward 
him,  her  lips  apart,  her  eyes  calling. 

Carniston  arose  smiling,  and  smiling  he  went 
toward  Lucy  and  kissed  her  on  the  forehead,  and 
she  kissed  him  on  the  cheek,  which  seemed  harsh 
and  lifeless  to  her — so  unlike  his  eyes,  which  were 
the  kind  that  never  grow  old. 

"It  is  like  a  fairy  tale,"  he  said.  "I  am  glad 
to  be  so  much  a  part  of  it  as  to  be  number  three." 

Arthur  telegraphed  to  Lucy  his  delight  with  her 
triumph.  Her  smile  in  answer  scarcely  indicated 
that  her  opinion  was  the  same  as  his.  She  was 
thinking  of  play-actresses. 

"Now  for  the  billiards!"  said  the  earl.  "Ar- 
thur may  be  a  spectator  of  this  contest  of  giants." 

He  gave  her  the  forty.  It  was  a  close  game. 
He  won  narrowly,  and  in  such  a  way  as  to  please 

46 


"  It  is  like  a  fairy  tale,"  he  said.      "lam  glad  to  be  so  much  a 
part  of  it  as  to  be  number  three  " 


The  Dowry   She  Brought 

his  vanity.  Then  they  bade  her  good-night  at  the 
foot  of  the  stairs,  and  when  the  last  sound  of  the 
rustle  of  her  skirts  had  passed  away,  Arthur  said: 

"Father,  you  have  been  splendid!  You  can't 
realise  how  I  love  her,  and  when  a  man  does  love 
as  I  do  I  fear  he  seems  impatient." 

"I  am  glad  to  see  you  so  happy.  Only  a  brute 
would  spoil  such  a  pretty  romance.  Good-night," 
was  the  response. 

Arthur  and  Lucy  met  at  the  breakfast-table 
early.  He  was  all  praise  and  congratulation,  and 
she,  a  little  pale,  was  smiling.  He  had  slept  well ; 
she  scarcely  at  all. 

"There  will  be  time  enough  for  a  long  stroll," 
he  remarked  at  length,  "before  my  father  is  up. 
His  hour  is  usually  ten." 

"I  beg  pardon,  sir,"  said  Horton,  "but  his  lord- 
ship was  up  at  six." 

"Unprecedented!  He  must  already  be  feeling 
those  added  ten  years,"  Arthur  declared. 

"It  is  ruinous  to  his  'ealth,  and  I  made  bold  to 
tell  'im  so.  But  he  said  he  had  business  with  his 
solicitor  in  town,  and  he  caught  the  seven-ten  train 
for  the  first  time  in  twenty  years,  I  think,  sir." 


47 


AMIABLE  TO  THE   END 

ALTHOUGH  neither  said  so,  each  tacitly  rec- 
ognised their  common  desire  that  the  run 
back  to  London  should  be  rapid.  His  father's 
departure  before  dawn  had  given  Arthur  an  un- 
comfortable feeling  which  remained  with  him. 
The  earl  had  seemed  the  last  man  in  the  world 
to  be  the  subject  of  an  energetic  impulse;  his  affairs 
the  last  affairs  in  the  world  to  be  influenced  by  a 
schedule  of  morning  trains.  It  was  Arthur,  now, 
who  had  become  despondent.  While  he  gave  his 
scepticism  no  word,  his  companion,  nevertheless, 
subtly  knew  of  its  existence. 

Lucy,  after  a  sleepless  night  and  an  experience 
which  had  drawn  heavily  on  her  strength,  wel- 
comed the  car's  bursts  of  speed  over  the  long 
stretches  of  clear  road  between  towns  and  villages, 
when  she  leaned  closer  to  Arthur  and  he  leaned 
closer  to  her,  as  if  each  was  listening  to  the  other, 
although  both  were  silent.  She  wanted  to  be  home, 
alone,  where  she  could  look  herself  in  the  face 

48 


Amiable  to  the  End 

again  and  rest,  and  think  over  all  that  had  passed 
since  yesterday. 

The  conditions  of  their  outward  journey  were 
reversed  in  that  she  was  now — or  she  assumed  to  be 
—the  optimist  of  the  pair.  She  spoke  of  the  earl  as 
kind  and  delightful;  of  how  much  easier  their 
meeting  had  been  than  they  anticipated. 

"I'll  try — I'll  try  ever  so  hard,  Arthur,  to  be  a 
countess  worthy  of  you  and  Burbridge.  With  you 
to  help  me,  and  with  me  to  help  you,  together  we 
shall  be  wise  and" — her  eyes  were  moist — "and 
I'll  always  love  you,  Arthur." 

Her  old  life  was  so  completely  gone,  this  great 
thing  of  the  new  life  had  so  completely  entered 
into  possession  of  her,  that  she  would  not  permit 
herself  to  conceive  of  the  battle  ending  otherwise 
than  in  victory. 

When  he  brought  the  machine  to  a  standstill 
before  the  von  Kar  gate,  he  said: 

"You  are  so  fine,  Lucy,  so  much  finer  than  even 
I  had  supposed !  It  will  be  my  duty  to  live  up  to 
you." 

That  moment  with  his  new  seriousness — later  to 
be  recalled  as  a  first  signal — with  his  new  look  of 
pride  in  her,  was  to  remain  with  her  as  a  mile- 
stone on  the  highway  at  a  point  where  it  crosses 
a  frontier. 

Her  invitation  to  luncheon  he  refused  on  the 
49 


Lucy  of  the  Stars 

ground  that  it  was  already  two  o'clock,  and  he 
hoped  to  find  his  father  and  take  him  back  in  the 
car.  He  stopped  at  the  first  tea-house  and  hastily 
ate  some  bread  and  meat,  and  then  passed  down 
Holborn  into  the  City,  where  he  had  never  gone 
before  except  to  draw  on  his  banker. 

"His  lordship  was  here  from  ten  till  twelve. 
We — er — had  many  details  to  go  over,"  said 
Wormley,  solicitor  and  man  of  affairs. 

"Did  he  mention  whether  he  was  going  back  to 
Burbridge  at  once  or  not?"  Arthur  asked. 

"I  believe  he  did  say  that  he  would  catch  the 
one  o'clock  train."  Wormley  went  with  him  to  the 
door.  "Ah,  his  lordship  is  very  fond  of  you,  sir — a 
most  amiable  father." 

He  seemed  to  have  something  more  on  the  end 
of  his  tongue;  but  he  had  been  a  solicitor  for 
twenty  years,  and  had  learned  not  to  give  unasked- 
for  advice  or  information. 

Arthur  pondered  on  whether  or  not  he  should 
go  back  to  Lucy  for  tea  and  dine  there,  and — was 
there  any  better  time? — meet  her  father  and  tell 
him  of  their  love.  Had  he  done  so,  this  would 
have  been  a  different  history.  If  one  wished  to 
enlarge  on  how  small  things  change  the  courses  of 
lives,  one  might  say  that  he  decided  to  the  contrary 
because  he  was  stuffy  with  dust  and  had  no  evening 
suit  in  town.    But  such  was  not  the  case. 

50 


Amiable  to  the  End 

Since  the  previous  night  his  father  had  appeared 
to  him  in  a  new  light.  The  old  earl  was  no  longer 
an  institution;  he  had  become  human  and  affec- 
tionate in  his  son's  eyes.  He  could  not  escape 
the  thought  that  his  father  was  making  some  sacri- 
fice on  his  account;  the  wounded  look  in  the  earl's 
eyes  at  times  while  he  had  listened  to  Lucy,  al- 
though not  impressing  Arthur  at  the  moment  had 
haunted  him  through  the  day  as  the  something 
concealed,  something  intimately  connected  with  his 
own  existence,  of  which  he  had  lived  in  ignorance. 

He  did  not  speed  much  on  the  journey  home- 
ward. One  runs  fast  in  order  to  escape  preoccu- 
pation, not  when  one  is  preoccupied.  Conse- 
quently, it  was  well  past  the  dinner  hour  when  he 
reached  Burbridge.  After  he  had  bathed  and 
dressed,  he  found  the  earl  still  at  table  over  his 
last  glass  of  port.  There  was  a  warmth  in  his 
father's  welcome  that  disarmed  some  of  Arthur's 
doubts. 

"You  quite  broke  all  the  settled  habits  of  Bur- 
bridge  this  morning,  sir,"  Arthur  said,  as  he  set 
to  ravenously. 

"Yes.  When  you  are  as  old  as  I  am,  Arthur, 
you  will  now  and  then  want  to  demonstrate  to  your- 
self that  you  have  not  lost  your  capacity  for  being 
active.  I  took  a  long  nap  yesterday  afternoon. 
So  I  awoke  at  five,  and  as  I  had  to  see  Wormley 

51 


Lucy  of  the  Stars 

I  took  the  early  train,  promising  myself  to  be  back 
before  dark.  Besides,  your  Lucy  is  so  electric  that 
she  imparted  some  of  her  energy  to  me,  I  think." 

"You  did  find  her  charming  and  a  girl  of  qual- 
ity?" There  was  much  more  that  Arthur  wanted 
to  ask,  but  his  father  put  a  stop  to  conversation  by 
rising. 

"I  have  a  letter  to  write,  and  I  shall  go  to  bed 
early.  I  found  your  Lucy  all,  quite  all  that  you 
painted  her.  To  you,  happiness  and  good-night!" 
With  which  he  drained  his  glass  and,  smiling 
fondly  at  Arthur,  left  the  table. 

"It's  so  hard  to  go  straight  to  my  father,"  Ar- 
thur mused.  "He  smothers  you  in  amiability,  and 
his  eyes  look  at  you  in  such  a  way  that  you  feel  that 
it  is  a  sin  to  be  unpleasant." 

Tired  after  his  long  ride,  his  thoughts  carried 
him  little  farther  that  night.  He  slept  soundly. 
When  he  awoke,  fresh  and  glowing  with  the  quickly 
renewed  strength  of  youth,  he  laughed  at  his 
doubts.  The  earl,  who  was  never  demonstrative 
over  anything,  had  not  been  demonstrative  in  his 
acquiescence. 

"It  shall  be  soon — very  soon!"  He  found  him- 
self at  breakfast  repeating  his  words  to  Lucy.  He 
would  go  to  London  that  afternoon  and  see  the 
doctor,  he  was  concluding  joyfully,  when  Horton 
laid  a  letter  on  the  table  before  him. 

5* 


Amiable  to  the  End 

"His  lordship  said  that  I  was  to  give  it  to  you 
this  morning,  sir.  He  was  very  pointed  about  it, 
and  that  I  should  not  disturb  him  till  he  called.', 

A  glance  told  Arthur  that  the  envelope  in  his 
hand  contained  more  than  a  note  of  something 
which  is  a  bedtime  after-thought.  It  was  sealed  in 
wax  with  his  father's  ring  and  bore  the  superscrip- 
tion "Personal"  in  the  upper  right-hand  corner, 
while  in  the  lower  left-hand  corner  was  the  legend: 
"After  you  have  finished  your  breakfast  and  lighted 
your  cigarette,  Arthur" — a  final  touch  of  that  cour- 
tesy which  gave  Lord  Carniston  his  character 
before  the  world. 

"My  Son: 

"During  the  last  forty-eight  hours  you  have 
given  me  the  intensest  pain  and  the  intensest  happi- 
ness that  I  have  ever  known.  By  grace  of  the  one 
the  other  has  been  concealed.  That  was  inevitable 
— for  so  I  was  born — strive  as  I  would  to  the 
contrary. 

"I  was  known  in  my  younger  years  as  the  'ami- 
able Carniston.'  To-day  I  am  not  known  at  all, 
for  such  is  the  end  of  amiable  people.  I  hear  this 
moment,  as  plainly  as  if  they  were  uttered  yester- 
day, the  words  of  a  woman  of  the  world  some 
thirty  years  ago,  spoken  when  she  did  not  know 
that  I  was  within  hearing:  'Oh,  Carny  is  too 
amiable  not  to  do  anything  you  ask,  and  if  he  can- 
not do  it  he  will  apologise  and  run  away.'     The 

53 


Lucy  of  the   Stars 


offence  of  her  remark  is  not  more  clear  than  the 
truth  of  it,  even  to  the  end  of  my  career.  I  am 
still  amiable,  which  is  a  polite  way  of  saying  that  I 
am  weak. 

"When  you  first  told  me,  with  colour  in  your 
cheeks  and  your  eye  flashing  determination,  of 
your  love  for  Lucy,  I  could  not  resist  you.  I  am 
proud  of  you,  Arthur.  At  your  age  I  was  a  scape- 
grace, running  through  my  father's  fortune.  You 
are  so  simple,  so  single-minded,  so  clean,  so  manly, 
such  a  fine  type  of  a  young  English  gentleman,  and 
you  were  so  straightforward  in  your  suit,  that  I 
had  the  infection  of  your  happiness,  and  I  invited 
the  little  girl  to  Burbridge,  thinking  that  a  way  out 
of  my  difficulty  would  show  itself.  She,  in  turn, 
made  herself  mistress  of  my  affections.  I  could  not 
in  your  presence  and  hers  lay  a  destroying  hand  on 
your  dream.  I  should  like  to  see  it  come  true — 
none  more  than  I. 

"Believe  me,  my  son,  I  am  writing  only  because 
if  I  began  telling  you,  especially  with  your  charm- 
ing Lucy  at  your  elbow,  I  should  compromise;  I 
should  be  amiable;  I  should  yield;  and  this  is  the 
time  when  I  must  not  yield  unless  I  wish  to  bring 
you  to  disaster. 

"You  will  be  charitable  enough,  I  know,  to  give 
me  credit  for  the  one  virtue  of  my  amiability,  which 
is  that  you  have  had  three  thousand  pounds  a  year 
while  I  have  rubbed  along  of  late  on  a  quarter  of 
the  amount.  At  least,  I  was  not  weak  when  Worm- 
ley  demanded  that  I  should  cut  your  allowance. 

54 


Amiable  to  the  End 

By  my  economy  for  your  sake,  by  my  effort  to  make 
some  reparation  to  you,  I  have  gained  a  kingdom 
of  happiness  new  to  me. 

"For  I  have  seen  you  living  like  a  gentleman, 
never  having  to  think  of  money — no  gentleman 
should.  You  have  never  spent  more  than  your 
allowance — no  gentleman  should — although  for- 
merly I  practised,  if  I  did  not  hold,  different  con- 
victions. You  are  handsome,  the  handsomest  of 
the  Steadleys.  I  hope  that  you  may  be  a  strong 
Steadley,  as  the  first  earl  and  the  great  hunter  were. 
You  have  the  manner,  the  qualities,  the  gifts  fitting 
you  for  the  place  to  which  birth  has  called  you. 

"What  have  I,  your  father,  your  guardian,  left 
you  with  which  to  fill  your  position?  Nothing, 
and  less  than  nothing;  and  out  of  it  for  the  last 
six  years  I  have  given  you  three  thousand.  My 
amiability  with  creditors,  Wormley  says,  amounts 
to  genius. 

"Be  thankful  that  your  hobby  is  science.  Mine 
was  gambling.  Your  mother's  dowry  I  have 
exhausted,  as  I  exhausted  such  mortgageable  re- 
sources of  the  estate  as  remained  after  my  father's 
death.  If  I  had  another  fortune,  doubtless  I 
should  let  it  slip  through  my  fingers  in  the  same 
way.  Penniless  as  I  am  by  my  own  fault,  I  should 
have  no  sense  of  humour  if  I  did  not  apologise  for 
pointing  a  moral  to  my  own  son.  It  was  ever 
so;  age  cautioning  youth.  Thirsty  youth  is  asked 
to  keep  away  from  that  fount  of  which  age  has 
drunk  its  fill. 

55 


Lucy  of  the  Stars 


"Yet  there  I  think  that  I  do  myself  a  little 
wrong.  If  the  quarter  of  a  million  that  we  need 
had  fallen  to  me  at  any  time  in  the  last  six  years, 
I  believe  I  should  have  kept  it,  thanks  to  your  in- 
spiration, my  son.  Since  you  became  twenty-one 
I  have  been  a  different  man.  When  I  heard  so 
much  praise  of  you  from  others  I  began  asking 
myself,  What  am  I  leaving  him?  Thereafter,  my 
amiability,  I  think,  was  something  of  a  mask — an 
easy  mask,  indeed,  for  one  of  my  character  to 
assume.  While  I  yearned  for  your  affection  and 
your  confidence,  I  kept  you  at  a  distance  for  fear 
that  you  might  learn  the  truth  which,  for  the  grati- 
fication of  seeing  you  free  and  happy,  I  concealed. 

"Your  love  romance  has  taught  me  the  wrong 
I  have  done  you  in  this  respect.  You  thought  that 
you  had  three  thousand  a  year  forever.  This  in- 
come was  as  much  a  part  of  your  existence,  thanks 
to  me,  as  the  air  you  breathed.  You  had  every 
reason  for  thinking  that  the  condition  of  our  estate 
was  as  sound  as  that  of  the  British  Treasury. 
Then  why  should  you  not  marry  as  you  pleased? 
I  grant  you,  as  your  choice  well  attested,  your  qual- 
ity of  mind  is  such  that  you  could  not  have  chosen 
one  unfitted  for  the  place  to  which  you  called  her. 
Too  late  I  realise  that  I  ought  to  have  bred  you 
by  degrees  to  the  necessity  which  now  suddenly 
descends  upon  you  to  break  her  heart,  your  heart 
and  my  heart.  No  kindness  could  have  been  more 
unkind  than  mine.  But  you  will  admit  that  head- 
strong marriage  for  love  is  not  among  the  char- 

56 


Amiable  to  the  End 

acteristics  of  our  caste — which  makes  it  all  the 
more  charming  in  you. 

"You  will  find  all  the  papers  with  Wormley, 
Arthur — all  the  ghosts  of  my  father's  misdeeds 
and  mine.  In  six  months,  at  the  latest,  Burbridge 
and  all  that  we  possess  will  go  under  the  hammer. 
We  have  to  deal  with  facts,  as  Wormley  said  yes- 
terday, 'and  funds  are  the  stubbornest  of  facts,  my 
lord.  The  world  entertains  respect  for  the  posi- 
tion which  it  grants  you  as  a  peer  of  England;  but, 
at  the  same  time,  it  insists  on  collecting  its  debts 
from  peer  as  well  as  commoner.  The  patent  of 
receipted  bills  is  mightier  than  any  patent  of 
nobility.' 

"Shall  I  say  more?  You  have  my  confession, 
and  you  have  the  truth  at  last.  Either  we  must 
have  money,  or  alien  footsteps  will  soon  sound  in 
this  hall,  and  aliens  will  sit  under  the  heads  of  the 
beasts  which  the  great  hunter  killed. 

"In  facing  the  problem  which  my  weakness  has 
left  you,  I  would  have  you  first  realise  that  you 
are  something  more  than  Arthur  Steadley  from 
this  day  forth.  Arthur  Steadley  or  John  Smith 
may  do  as  he  pleases,  but  not  so  the  seventh  Earl 
of  Carniston.  You  become  a  link  in  the  career  of 
a  great  house;  you  become  an  institution.  You 
have  a  duty  to  your  family,  to  your  caste. 

"It  is  the  noblesse  oblige  of  our  nobility  that 
preserves  England.  As  a  whole,  our  aristocracy 
has  always  retained  some  sense  of  duty.  Other 
nations  have  risen  and  fallen,  other  nobilities  have 

57 


Lucy  of  the   Stars 

gone  to  the  guillotine,  and  still  England  has  sur- 
vived and  will  survive,  and  with  her  the  peerage, 
long  after  present-day  rivals  have  run  the  swift 
race  instead  of  the  sure  race  of  our  customs  and 
our  climate.  The  people  have  demanded  liberties 
and  we  have  yielded  them  liberties — but  always 
yielded  as  if  we  gave — while  we  had  only  to  take 
the  Radical  leaders  into  the  peerage  in  order  to 
make  them  Tories.  Down  in  the  City,  to  the  ends 
of  the  empire,  in  every  walk  of  life,  men  are  striv- 
ing for  titles;  striving  toward  the  standard  which 
our  caste  sets.  Their  ambition  is  to  have  their 
descendants  like  us.  When  their  sons  have  at- 
tained that  end  the  family  property  is  dissipated, 
the  family  eventually  becomes  extinct,  and  thus 
there  is  always  room  for  the  climbers  who  are  com- 
ing up  the  ladder.  I  think  they  are  coming  too 
fast.  Too  many  are  entering  on  motors  fresh 
from  the  market,  with  money  as  their  only  pass- 
port. 

"The  question  you  have  to  ask  yourself,  Arthur, 
is  whether  the  time  has  come  when  our  family,  too, 
must  pass  away.  Will  you  make  another  place  for 
the  newcomers  ?  Will  you  give  up  your  heritage  ? 
Observe  how  our  portionless  younger  sons  accept 
their  lot  and  carry  our  character  abroad  in  the  rule 
of  our  colonies.  Our  whole  social  system  is  one  of 
playing  the  part  that  falls  to  you.  Thus  we  keep 
up  our  checks  and  balances.  But  you  may  say,  with 
your  new  ideas  which  are  imbibed  in  laboratories, 
that  our  time  has  come,  and  let  us  accept  the  in- 

58 


Amiable  to  the  End 

evitable.  Then  let  me  say  to  you,  my  son,  out  of 
the  depth  of  my  experience,  that  when  you  have 
reached  my  age  no  love  of  woman  will  ever  atone 
for  your  loss  of  Burbridge.  By  marrying  Lucy 
you  may  yet  bring  yourself  and  her  such  unhap- 
piness  as  neither  would  have  known  had  you  done 
your  duty  to  that  fate  which  has  made  you  seventh 
in  the  line  of  a  great  house. 

"No,  you  cannot  have  your  Lucy  and  have  Bur- 
bridge,  too.  Again  I  hear  you  repeating  bitterly 
that  question  which  has  haunted  me  these  last  two 
days,  'Why  did  you  not  tell  me  all  this  before?' 
Because  I  did  not  do  my  duty;  and,  on  awakening 
to  it,  I  am  going  to  pay  the  penalty  and  make  you 
the  only  reparation  in  my  power.  To  the  last  I 
am  the  amiable  and  easy-going  Carniston;  so  take 
warning  lest  you  be  known  as  the  romantic  Carnis- 
ton. If  I  seem  to  ramble,  forgive  me.  I  dare  not 
start  to  write  the  letter  over  again,  lest  I  should 
weaken  and  fail  in  my  purpose. 

"I  have  often  thought  of  a  rich  marriage  for 
you.  I  would  have  planned  to  that  end  if  I  had  not 
been  weak.  You  know  how  little  I  have  kept  in 
touch  with  the  world  of  late.  When  I  brought 
Miss  Hodges  to  Burbridge  it  was  with  the  idea  of 
a  romance  of  wisdom,  instead  of  a  romance  of  folly 
such  as  broke  upon  me  within  an  hour  after  she 
had  left  the  house.  She  is  attractive;  she  would  do 
credit  to  you  as  Countess  of  Carniston.  I  know 
that  she  is  not  Lucy ;  she  is  not  an  English  girl ;  but 
in  a  year  she  would  be  English  in  speech  and 

59 


Lucy  of  the  Stars 

thought,  and  she  would  spurn  her  own  country  as 
the  climber  always  spurns  the  ladder  when  the 
ascent  is  made  and  footing  on  the  crest  is  secure. 

"I  foresee  for  you  such  a  journey  as  I  once 
made.  It  is  one  not  without  interest  and  amuse- 
ment. In  romantic  days  a  nobleman  rode  out  of 
his  castle  with  his  followers  and  brought  the  lady 
home  on  the  back  of  his  saddle.  In  this  money 
age  he  takes  an  Atlantic  liner.  You  will  find  some 
prejudice  in  America  against  what  they  call  for- 
tune-hunting lords.  There  the  only  standard  of 
position  is  money.  To  our  cousins — many  of  whom 
you  will  find  speak  a  strange  sort  of  English — the 
man  who  has  not  money  and  cannot  make  it  and 
marries  rich  is  much  the  same  as  a  knight  of 
Round  Table  days  who  hired  a  man  to  fight  in  the 
lists  in  his  place.  Instead  of  saying,  'I  have  con- 
quered a  province,'  or  'I  have  defeated  my  enemy 
in  battle/  the  American  demands  the  love  of  his 
lady  on  the  score  that  he  has  made  a  million. 

"To  the  rich  American,  as  a  rule,  life  means 
greed  of  dividends  and  a  kind  of  electric  massage. 
They  know  how  to  keep  their  money.  It  were 
better  if  they  knew  how  to  lose  it  gracefully. 
Thus  they  would  make  room  for  others.  Instead, 
they  are  perpetuating  an  aristocracy  whose  future 
is  a  problem.  When  you  come  to  know  them  you 
will  be  thankful  for  our  forms  and  our  prejudices, 
and  thankful  that  the  first  earl  served  the  State. 
You  cannot  serve  the  State  without  some  sense  of 
duty  to  the  whole.    A  girl  of  the  second  generation 

60 


Amiable  to  the  End 

from  the  West,  although  she  is  handicapped  with 
a  common  mother,  comes  frequently  of  yeoman 
rather  than  trading  stock  and,  having  had  the  ad- 
vantages of  a  foreign  education,  as  Miss  Hodges 
has  had,  will  the  more  readily  conform  to  our  life 
and  bear  you  better  and  healthier  children. 

"Money  you  need  as  the  coal;  the  machine  is 
the  earldom.  In  bringing  your  lady's  fortune 
home  you  are  serving  England  as  much  as  the 
emigrant  who  brings  his  millions  back  to  spend 
in  the  mother  country.  We  are  making  America 
a  country  of  absentees.  We  shall  keep  the  para- 
dise of  our  country-places,  our  stoicism,  and  self- 
restraint,  and  renew  our  bank  accounts  and  freshen 
our  blood  from  the  workshops  across  the  sea.  The 
other  day  when  that  extraordinary  man  Frane  was 
here,  he  used  an  expression,  'the  love  of  the  land,' 
which  has  stuck  in  my  mind.  It  expresses  the  spirit 
that  has  made  England,  and  it  sounded  strange 
on  the  lips  of  an  American.  Some  Americans  boast 
a  great  deal,  but  'the  love  of  the  land'  most  of  them 
do  not  understand  at  all.  It  is  a  good  phrase. 
The  land  you  should  love,  Arthur,  is  your  acres 
at  Burbridge.  You  see,  according  to  your  position, 
you  must  do  your  part  for  England.  Only  in 
America  does  one  do  quite  as  he  pleases. 

"Your  personal  distinction  is  a  valuable  adjunct 
in  your  quest.  But  you  have  something  even  more 
valuable,  according  to  the  standard  of  calculating 
American  mothers.  It  is  the  delight  of  the  Ameri- 
can rich,  who  too  often  hold  their  own  government 

6l 


Lucy  of  the  Stars 

in  cynical  contempt,  to  buy  for  their  daughters  the 
rank  which  another  government  bestows.  As  I 
enter  you  for  the  race,  it  is  only  right  that  I  should 
remove  your  handicap.  Yesterday  you  were  the 
son  of  a  bankrupt  old  nobleman,  who  might  have 
kept  a  faltering  hold  on  life  for  twenty  years.  By 
that  time  you  would  be  so  old  that  you  would  have 
to  marry  the  widow  rather  than  the  daughter  of  a 
millionaire.  To-day  you  are  Carniston — Carnis- 
ton  at  twenty-seven. 

"Yesterday  I  haggled  for  the  last  time  with 
Wormley.  I  arranged  a  credit  of  two  thousand 
pounds  for  you,  and  a  respite  in  our  affairs  for  six 
months. 

"I  rely  on  your  discretion  to  burn  this  letter; 
and,  in  respect  to  a  more  delicate  matter,  I  rely 
on  that  of  Dr.  Judson,  who  has  continually  warned 
me  that  my  heart  was  weak.  Yes,  you  can  depend 
on  Judson. 

"I  ask  you  lastly,  Arthur,  to  bear  this  in  mind: 
For  your  sake  I  have  absented  myself  from  town ; 
I  have  given  up  the  Riviera  and  a  summer  water- 
ing-place; and  I  have  foregone  many  little  pleas- 
ures. If  your  romance  has  made  that  seem  an 
unkindness  to  you,  why,  it  is  a  reflection  only  on 
my  wisdom  and  not  on  my  love,  which  makes  this 
final  act  of  reparation  to  you. 

"Carniston. 

"P.  S.  If  you  do  decide  to  send  Burbridge  un- 
der the  hammer,  then  I  beg  of  you  to  destroy  all 

62 


Amiable  to  the  End 

the  heads,  or  arrange  that  they  be  given  to  a  mu- 
seum. Let  no  stranger  have  them.  But  keep  one 
— that  of  the  lion  over  the  mantel — and  hang  it  in 
the  Bloomsbury  lodgings  where  you  and  Lucy  will 
have  the  awakening  from  your  dream.  You  know 
that  the  hunter  killed  the  lion  that  killed  him.  I 
like  him  the  best  of  all  the  Steadleys.  How  often 
have  I  craved  a  little  of  his  strength!" 

The  door  of  the  earl's  room  was  unlocked.  He 
was  stretched  on  his  couch  in  the  attitude  of  over- 
whelming slumber  after  exhaustion.  An  unopened 
bottle  filled  with  laudanum  had  fallen  from  his 
hand  to  the  floor.  He  who  at  last  had  the  deter- 
mination to  carry  a  plan  through,  found  in  his  pass- 
ing that  the  world  toward  which  he  had  been  so 
amiable  was  still  amiable  to  him.  The  pressure 
upon  his  heart  of  distress  and  excitement  had 
obviated  the  need  of  any  discretion  on  the  part  of 
the  family  doctor. 


63 


VI 


CRAVING   THE    HUNTER^    STRENGTH 


LUCY  first  learned  of  the  Earl  of  Carniston's 
death  in  the  newspapers,  which  recalled,  as 
if  noting  the  salient  point  of  his  career,  thaNthe 
"amiable  Carny"  had  been  a  famous  beau  in  his 
younger  days.  She  sent  one  of  the  servants  im- 
mediately to  Burbridge  with  a  note  which  at 
once  expressed  her  feelings  and  her  sense  of  the 
situation. 

"It  seems  so  unnatural,"  she  wrote,  "for  me  not 
to  go  to  you,  and  yet  I  comprehend  that  to  the 
world  it  would  be  unnatural,  not  to  say  scandal- 
ous, if  I  did.  The  secret  that  holds  us  together 
keeps  us  apart.  Please  know,  dear  Arthur,  that 
I  am  thinking  of  you  every  moment  in  this  your 
terrible  ordeal,  and  please  feel  that  I  am  sending 
you  through  space  all  the  love  and  sympathy  that 
my  heart  can  hold." 

When  Dr.  Judson  had  pronounced  life  extinct 
in  Carniston's  body  he  addressed  Arthur  as  "your 
lordship,"  remarking,  in  the  comforting  way  of  the 

64 


Craving  the  Hunter's  Strength 

medical  profession  on  such  occasions,  that  the  late 
earl  had  blessedly  passed  away  without  pain. 

"If  one  must  go,  as  we  all  must,"  he  said,  "one 
would  certainly  choose  to  go  in  this  manner.  He 
felt  a  little  tired ;  he  lay  down  on  the  couch,  and  he 
went  to  sleep." 

At  that  moment  Arthur's  fingers  were  in  his  coat 
pocket  beside  his  father's  letter  and  clasping  the 
bottle  of  laudanum  which  he  had  taken  from  the 
floor.  In  the  hour  that  had  elapsed  before  the 
doctor's  arrival  he  had  not  spoken  a  dozen  words, 
but  aghast  had  stared  alternately  out  of  the  win- 
dow and  at  the  still  figure  before  him. 

When  the  doctor  led  him  from  the  death 
chamber  Horton  brought  "my  lord"  a  glass  of 
brandy,  which  was  refused.  First  the  undertaker 
and  then  the  members  of  the  family  and  the  ten- 
ants addressed  him  by  his  title  as  naturally  as  if 
he  and  not  his  father  had  always  borne  it. 
Whether  the  callers  expressed  their  sympathy  eas- 
ily and  superficially  or  awkwardly  and  sincerely, 
they  seemed  in  a  conspiracy  against  the  thing  which 
was  master  of  his  heart.  They  were  showing  him 
that  he  was  not  a  free  agent,  but  a  link  in  the  chain. 

In  company  of  Mrs.  Monckton,  a  friend  of  the 
family,  Lucy  came  to  the  funeral,  returning  to 
town  immediately  after  the  obsequies.  She  did 
not  see  Arthur  to  speak  with  him.    Their  eyes  met 

65 


Lucy  of  the  Stars 

as  the  rest  of  the  congregation  were  waiting  for 
the  mourners  to  come  out  of  the  church.  In  his 
was  an  appeal  for  sympathy  which  hers  sent  swim- 
mingly in  answer. 

He  wanted  to  go  to  her  the  next  day,  and  he 
dared  not.  He  wanted  to  go  to  her  in  the  same 
frame  of  mind  in  which  he  had  gone  when  he  re- 
turned from  Norway ;  but  he  knew  that  that  was  as 
impossible  as  to  bring  his  father  to  life.  Instead, 
he  was  pacing  the  floor  of  the  library  when  he  was 
not  at  his  desk  writing  to  Lucy.  The  long  letter 
in  which  he  told  her  all  his  thoughts  and  in  which 
he  submitted  to  the  inevitable  he  tore  up  at  last 
with  a  cry  of  "I  cannot!"  Then  notes  which  he 
called  cowardly  and  notes  which  he  called  quixotic 
or  deceitful  followed  one  the  other  into  the  waste- 
basket. 

"How  you  helped  me,"  he  wrote  at  last,  fever- 
ishly, in  the  exhaustion  of  his  wits,  "yesterday  in 
church !  You  have  the  art  of  goodness  as  well  as 
goodness  itself.  It  was  like  you  to  come,  and,  com- 
ing at  a  time  when  words  are  hollow  and  thought 
is  full  and  supreme,  to  make  your  presence  near  me 
felt.  How  our  natures  are  attuned,  sweetheart! 
What  a  bulwark  of  strength  your  note  was — and 
the  knowledge  that  you  have  been  thinking  of  me 
through  it  all !  You  can  realise  how  the  shock  has 
overwhelmed  me  and  left  me  numb.    I  feel  that  I 

66 


Craving  the  Hunter's   Strength 

must  go  away  for  a  few  days,  to  rest,  to  think, 
and  to  find  myself.  Then,  when  I  am  a  little 
recovered,  I  shall  come  to  see  you." 

What  right  had  he  to  call  her  sweetheart?  he 
asked  himself.  But  who  else  ever  had  the  right 
or  could  have  the  right?  "This,  too,  is  deceitful 
and  cowardly  and  clumsy,"  he  thought.  "But  if 
I  try  again  I  shall  do  no  better." 

He  knew  of  a  quiet  hotel  by  the  sea  where  he 
could  be  completely  isolated.  There,  by  himself, 
he  would  decide  whether  it  was  to  be  Lucy  with- 
out Burbridge  or  Burbridge  without  Lucy.  He 
tramped  over  the  cliffs  till  his  legs  ached  from 
fatigue,  but  not  more  than  his  brain  ached  from 
the  pain  of  battle.  Free  from  the  surroundings  of 
his  position,  his  inclination  was  the  weightier  of 
the  two  antagonists  which  were  struggling  in  his 
mind  for  victory.  When  his  bag  was  packed  for 
his  return  he  had  come  to  a  decision.  He  had 
chosen  Lucy  without  Burbridge. 

Still  his  determination  was  not  founded  on  the 
rock.  He  felt  that  he  needed  the  strengthening 
advice  of  some  older  man,  used  to  the  world. 
Lord  Brent,  with  his  liberal  ideas  and  his  con- 
tempt for  rank  and  anything  but  merit,  must  agree 
with  him.  On  the  way  home  he  stopped  over  for 
a  morning  at  the  old  scientist's  country-place,  ex- 
pecting to  be  told  that  he  had  shown  a  fine  self- 

67. 


Lucy  of  the  Stars 

reliance  and  independence  of  tradition  in  making 
battle  with  the  world  for  a  livelihood  in  the  name 
of  the  girl  of  his  heart. 

Of  all  men  Lord  Brent,  gentle,  venerable  sa- 
vant, was  the  last  to  consult  on  an  affair  of  love, 
which  is  not  a  thing  for  chemical  analysis.  Arthur 
did  not  show  the  old  scientist  his  father's  letter, 
but  he  told  him  candidly  and  confidentially  of  the 
situation  and  of  his  engagement  to  Lucy.  Brent 
was  as  abstract  as  usual.  It  seemed  that  he  who 
had  been  called  the  socialist  peer  was  not  so  much 
of  a  radical  after  all  when  you  scratched  him. 

"Lucy  is  a  practical  girl,"  he  said.  "She  will 
not  want  to  marry  a  penniless  earl  any  more  than 
you  will  want  to  marry  her.  The  revelations  of 
your  father's  insolvency  dissolve  any  contract 
which  was  made  on  the  understanding  of  his  sol- 
vency. Of  course,  when  one  is  young  he  has  fan- 
cies. I  believe  I  had  one  that  I  should  marry  a 
tall,  dark  girl  because  of  my  theory  of  opposites. 
However,  I  married  a  blonde  girl,  who  has  made 
me  an  excellent  wife  and  borne  me  five  fine  chil- 
dren. One  grows  out  of  these  things ;  or  he  gives 
them  up  in  the  face  of  events,  if  he  is  at  all  a  man 
of  reason.  As  for  you,  my  dear  Carniston" — pre- 
viously Lord  Brent  had  called  him  Arthur — "I 
should  say" — and  he  looked  him  over — "that  with 
your  title  and  your  appearance  you  will  have  no 

68 


Craving  the  Hunter's  Strength 

trouble  in  contracting  a  marriage  which  will  set 
your  affairs  right.  An  income,  indeed,  is  the  first 
premise  for  one  who  pursues  science  for  its  own 
sake." 

uMy  father's  idea — the  world's  idea !  I  am  to 
be  put  up  at  auction,"  Arthur  thought  bitterly. 

"So  far  from  having  any  scruples  on  this  score," 
Lord  Brent  continued,  "you  must  realise  that  you 
are  giving  the  lady  a  quid  pro  quo  in  the  position 
which  she  attains.  She  will  be  preoccupied  with 
that,  and  you  will  have  the  leisure  for  your  re- 
searches, which,  as  you  grow  older,  will  become 
more  absorbing.  Indeed,  when  we  graybeards  are 
gone  I  expect  you  to  become  one  of  the  leaders." 

"Suppose  I  do  not  see  it  that  way.  I  myself 
— I  count  a  little — the  personal  equation,"  said 
Arthur,  amazed  at  this  soft-spoken  materialism 
from  such  a  source,  and  trying  to  make  his  point 
clear  to  the  scientific  mind. 

It  was  Lord  Brent's  turn  to  be  astounded. 

"You  can  scarcely  choose,"  he  said.  "Noblesse 
oblige,  my  dear  fellow." 

"I  may  if  I  will.  Why  should  not  Burbridge 
go  under  the  hammer?  Let  those  who  have  money 
to  maintain  it  fall  heir  to  that  which  my  ancestors 
have  lost  by  their  failure  to  play  the  game,  as  I 
heard  Frane,  an  American,  say  the  other  day.  You 
yourself  have  often  spoken  of  the  democracy  of 

69 


Lucy  of  the  Stars 

our  aristocracy  and  of  its  continual  renewal  from 
the  commons  as  a  most  beneficent  feature  of  our 


"Ah,  yes,  I  did  make  that  point  only  last  year 
in  the  Lords,  and  rather  got  the  better  of  Mox- 
bridge  on  the  argument.  Er — you  did  not  quite 
follow  my  reasoning  to  its  logical  end.  How- 
ever, that  is  beside  the  point.  My  dear  Carniston, 
you  are  not  one  that  needs  renewing."  Lord  Brent 
laughed  a  little  over  his  mild  humour. 

"Suppose  I  do  take  Lucy.  Isn't  it  possible  that 
I  could  earn  my  own  living?  Dr.  von  Kar  does 
as  a  working  chemist,"  cried  the  enthusiast.  "At 
least,  I  could  try." 

Lord  Brent  was  not  a  self-made  peer.  This 
subject  of  earning  a  living  was  entirely  out  of  his 
orbit. 

"Ah,  yes,  von  Kar  is  a  remarkable  man.  He 
seems  to  have  many  compartments  to  his  brain, 
each  sealed  to  the  people  who  deal  with  the  others. 
The  compartment  that  I  know  is  that  of  the  ex- 
perimenter. No,  no,  you  must  put  away  such 
vagaries.  You  must  fulfil  the  destiny  for  which 
you  were  born.  You  must  accept  the  part  which 
the  world  has  assigned  to  you.  By  the  way,  I  have 
just  received  a  most  interesting  pamphlet  from 
Professor  Werner  of  Vienna,  in  which  he  gives 
the  results  of  his  investigation  of  how  a  bird  is 

70 


Craving  the  Hunter's  Strength 

enabled  to  keep  his  perch  or  a  bat  his  hold  on  a 
rafter  despite  the  relaxation  of  the  tendons  and 
muscles  in  sleep.  I  trust  that  you  will  enlarge  the 
laboratory  at  Burbridge  when  you  have  brought 
your  rich  bride  from  America — which  is  the  place 
where  the  rich  brides  come  from  these  days,  I  be- 
lieve— and  that  we  may  have  many  pleasant  meet- 
ings of  fellow-spirits  there.  This  Carniston,  I  am 
sure,  will  be  known  as  Carniston  the  scientist." 

On  the  train  journey  homeward  Arthur  thought 
again  of  all  that  his  father  had  told  him,  and  of  the 
earl's  love  and  sacrifice.  At  Burbridge  the  letters 
which  awaited  him  were  further  testimony  of  how 
conventionality  makes  puppets  of  those  born  to 
position.  The  first,  to  his  father  from  an  old 
friend  visiting  in  America,  began  "Dear  Carny." 
The  second  was  also  addressed  to  the  Earl  of  Car- 
niston. It  was  a  note  of  sympathy  from  one  of 
his  own  friends,  then  in  Switzerland,  who  had 
always  called  him  Arthur.  It  also  began  "Dear 
Carny."  Thus  the  nickname  which  his  father  and 
grandfather  had  borne  was  bestowed  on  him  as  a 
matter  of  course.  He  was  Carny  and  he  was  Car- 
niston, with  all  the  responsibility  which  the  title 
entailed.    There  was  no  way  of  escape. 

Two  tenants  came  to  him  that  morning,  think- 
ing that  they  would  be  beforehand  in  noting  their 
wants  directly  to  the  new  lord.    The  rector  called. 

71 


Lucy  of  the  Stars 

A  member  of  the  council  of  the  nearest  town  waited 
on  him  to  ask  if  he  would  take  the  place  on  certain 
boards  which  had  been  made  vacant  by  the  lament- 
able death  of  the  late  earl.  When  he  took  a  ride 
for  exercise  down  the  lanes  which  were  his  and 
his  ancestors'  he  felt  for  the  first  time  the  pride  of 
primogeniture,  which  will  never  permit  a  man  to 
give  up  that  which  he  complains  is  irksome  to  him. 
The  man  of  title  envies  the  freedom  of  the  com- 
moner and  clings  closer  to  his  title.  The  rich  man 
envies  the  happiness  of  the  poor  man  and  clings 
closer  to  his  millions.  Every  one's  true  rivals  who 
make  the  race  for  him  are  on  the  track  where  he 
runs. 

If  he  had  money  he  could  meet  the  tenants' 
desires;  he  could  make  the  repairs  for  which  the 
rector  pleaded;  he  could  provide  the  hospital  in 
town  with  the  funds  it  needed.  He  cursed  the 
grandfather  who  had  begun  the  extravagance;  he 
could  not  forego  a  feeling  of  resentment  toward 
his  own  father.  The  hunter  earl,  who  had  always 
seemed  a  savage,  suddenly  became  noble  and 
praiseworthy,  as  the  lion  who  brings  home  the 
prey  is  noble  and  praiseworthy  to  his  young.  On 
his  travels  the  hunter  had  seen  opportunities  and 
made  investments  which  the  fifth  earl  could  not 
altogether  expend,  and  which  had  been  the  sixth 
earl's  best  security. 

72 


Craving  the  Hunter's  Strength 

The  next  morning,  as  he  turned  out  of  the  gate 
on  his  way  to  London  to  his  solicitor  and  to  Lucy, 
he  wondered  how  it  would  seem  never  to  re-enter 
that  gate  again  except  as  a  visitor;  to  have  the 
village  people  looking  up  to  one  who  was  not  a 
Carniston;  to  have  the  hunter's  heads  in  a  museum. 
He  put  the  car  at  full  speed  to  escape  his  thoughts, 
and  drove  so  fast  that  he  was  at  Wormley's  office 
by  eleven. 

The  solicitor  expressed  his  profound  grief  over 
uthe  sudden  and  terrible"  news,  and  gradually 
approached  the  point  where  form  ends  and  business 
begins. 

"Lord  Carniston,"  he  said,  "was  a  man  of 
extraordinary  discretion;  and  although  he  ex- 
pressed to  me  his  intention  of  taking  you  into  his 
confidence  at  once  about  your  affairs,  I  can  scarcely 
conceive  that  he  had  the  time  to  carry  out  his  de- 
sign— which  was,  in  fact,  a  part  of  our  agreement 
by  which  I  gave  him  a  further  credit  on  your  be- 
half. If  I  could  be  sure  of  your  own  knowledge 
of  the  state  of  his  affairs,  my  lord,  I  should  know 
where  to  begin  in  my  accounting  to  you." 

"I  think  that  my  father  told  me  all,"  said 
Arthur,  flinching  a  little,  "including  the  security 
for  the  new  credit." 

"Er — quite  right,"  said  Wormley,  taken  by 
surprise.    The  new  earl  was  apparently  a  different 

73 


Lucy  of  the  Stars 

type  from  the  old,  who  would  have  reached  the 
same  point  by  many  coughs  and  much  leading. 
"It  means  a  saving  of  time,"  thought  the  practical 
man. 

"My  father  also  said  that  you  had  all  the  papers 
in  order  so  that  I  might  go  over  them  and  inform 
myself  of  my  responsibility." 

The  mass  of  them  amazed  Carniston — as  we 
must  call  him  now — who  as  he  examined  document 
after  document  of  the  record  of  his  family's  wis- 
dom and  folly  felt  them  clutching  his  own  exis- 
tence as  a  part  of  theirs.  Wisdom  lay  in  the  will 
of  the  first  earl,  and  more  than  wisdom — foresight 
and  cunning  and  plunder — in  the  contracts  and  the 
letters  of  the  hunter. 

"A  wonderful  man,  the  fourth  earl,"  Wormley 
ventured.  "If  we  had  that  real  estate  he  bought 
in  Chicago,  which  I  am  told  is  to-day  worth  five 
million  pounds  on  a  basis  of  five  per  cent,  net! 
See  what  he  says  here : 

"  'The  thing  is  to  travel  for  yourself  and  see. 
Never  trust  one  man's  report  till  you  check  it  off 
with  another's.  Do  not  allow  insular  prejudices 
or  the  reigning  political  passion  to  divert  you  from 
the  basic  idea  that  investments  in  a  growing  land 
mean  increasing  income  and  increasing  capital  as 
well.  Railroads  will  plant  cities  throughout  the 
West.     Immigration  will  pour  in  from  Europe. 

74 


Craving  the  Hunter's  Strength 

There  need  be  no  fears  of  the  stability  of  the 
government,  however  vulgar  and  stupid  and  pro- 
vincial it  is.  In  a  country  where  so  many  own 
property  the  government  is  a  government  of 
property.  Hold  these  barren  lands;  they  will  be 
a  part  of  the  city  one  of  these  days.'  " 

"And  we  sold  them  thirty  years  ago  because 
their  loss  affected  us  sentimentally  less  than  that  of 
any  other  asset,"  observed  Arthur.  "  To-day  the 
wolves  are  snapping  their  jaws  at  the  very  horses' 
heads  and — thank  you,  Mr.  Wormley." 

Arthur  assisted  the  solicitor  in  tying  up  the 
bundles.  When  they  had  finished  and  he  rose,  the 
freshness  of  his  complexion  and  his  height  show- 
ing to  advantage  in  the  dingy  city  office,  Wormley 
observed,  with  a  touch  of  admiration  and  loyalty : 

"I  must  say,  your  lordship,  I  don't  think  that 
you  will  have  any  difficulty  in  making  your  mission 
to  America  a  success." 

"I  seem  to  have  been  bred  and  fashioned  by  my 
Maker  for  the  purpose  of  contracting  a  wealthy 
marriage,"  Carniston  thought  angrily. 

"And  if  it  should  happen,"  Wormley  continued, 
"that  you  did  not  wish  to  hurry  matters,  and  your 
engagement  was  announced,  there  would  be  no 
trouble  in  securing  another  thousand  or  so  from 
the  creditors." 

This  brutalising  touch  put  Arthur  on  edge. 
75 


Lucy  of  the  Stars 

"When  I  have  sold  myself  do  you  want  a  bill 
of  sale?"  he  demanded  in  a  temper. 

Wormley,  too,  had  his  dignity.  It  was  he  who 
had  secured  the  two  thousand  pounds  by  leading 
the  creditors  to  put  in  a  little  more  to  save  what 
had  gone  before. 

uYou  will  pardon  me,  Lord  Carniston,"  he  said, 
"but  you  deal  with  me  as  a  business  agent;  and  as 
a  business  agent,  when  your  father's  wishes  were 
expressed,  I  dealt  with  him  as  I  deal  with  you." 

Arthur  appreciated  the  logic  of  the  answer.  He 
found  himself  liking  Wormley  better  than  he  had 
at  first. 

"I  beg  your  pardon,"  he  said.  "Please  accept 
my  extremity  as  an  excuse.  If  your  own  son — if 
you  have  one — had  to  go  across  the  sea  to  marry 
a  woman  for  her  money — I  am  not  putting  it  with 
polite  indirection — do  you  think  that  he  would 
like  it?" 

"Our  situations  are  different,"  said  Wormley, 
in  astonishment.  "The  funds  are  ready  for  you 
whenever  you  decide  to  start."  He  laid  stress  on 
the  qualifying  clause,  which  indicated  that  the 
money  was  not  to  be  spent  in  England. 

"Yes,  thank  you,"  said  Arthur  absently. 

As  he  swung  his  car  out  of  the  alley  where 
Wormley  had  his  offices  into  the  stream  of  traffic, 
and  looked  at  the  striving  crowds  in  the  new  light 

76 


Craving  the  Hunter's   Strength 

of  the  training  of  each  unit  for  the  battle  of  indi- 
vidualism he  was  waging,  and  thought  of  himself 
at  twenty-seven  without  a  single  lesson  in  the  busi- 
ness of  earning  a  living,  he  realised  his  helpless- 
ness. He  had  been  fitted  for  a  destiny;  they  had 
been  trained  for  tasks  in  which  success  was  the 
reward  of  effort. 

"The  hunter  was  a  beast,"  he  told  himself,  "but, 
oh,  he  was  a  beast  who  could  fight  beasts.  He 
was  a  lion.  I,  too,  wish  with  my  father  that  I  had 
his  strength.  He  would  have  had  Lucy,  and  he 
would  have  kept  Burbridge,  too.  How,  I  do  not 
know;  but  he  would." 

This  was  still  the  circle  of  his  whirling  thoughts 
when  he  stopped  before  the  von  Kar  gate. 


77 


VII 

DISPENSING  WITH   PLATO 

HIS  delay  in  coming  to  her  had  cut  Lucy  deep. 
She  tried  to  read  his  letter  as  written  and 
to  avoid  the  fear  thrusting  its  head  out  between 
the  lines  to  say  that  fate  was  working  against  their 
love.  Since  the  earl  himself  had  smiled  on  their 
betrothal,  since  they  themselves  had  made  solemn 
faith,  she  had  unfurled  the  flag  of  confidence  and 
shut  her  ears  to  scepticism. 

Had  Carniston  gone  to  her  with  a  clear  outline 
of  obstacles,  however  threatening,  to  be  overcome 
in  a  union  of  counsel  and  effort,  he  might  have 
found  in  her  some  of  the  fearlessness  and  creative 
qualities  for  which  he  liked  the  hunter,  and  with 
them  the  womanly  sympathy  which  hardens  reso- 
lution. As  he  approached  the  door  he  became 
conscious  that  although  he  had  something  which 
he  must  say  he  was  going  inside  without  any  idea 
of  how  he  was  to  say  it. 

"If  I  began  telling  you,  especially  with  your 
charming  Lucy  at  your  elbow" — this  section  of  his 
father's  letter  ran  through  his  mind — "I  should 

78 


Dispensing  with  Plato 

compromise,  I  should  yield;  and  this  is  the  time 
when  I  must  not  yield  unless  I  wish  to  bring  you 
disaster." 

Fearing  the  descent  of  his  father's  weakness 
upon  him  when  he  needed  the  hunter's  strength, 
Carniston  had  a  rush  of  firmness  and  resolution — 
so  he  flattered  himself.  Under  this  false  spell  he 
became  unkind  to  himself  and  to  her. 

She  was  going  to  give  him  a  sweetheart's  em- 
brace, but  something  in  his  face  forbade.  Theirs 
was  the  compromise  of  clasped  hands  which  may 
indicate  either  rapture  or  separation.  Although 
his  expression  was  one  of  constraint,  her  eyes  were 
brimming  with  sympathy  as  she  spoke. 

"You  must  feel  as  if  you  had  lived  a  hundred 
years  in  a  week,"  she  said.  "You  are  pale  and 
worn,  as  I  knew  you  would  be.  I  could  imagine 
you  and  see  you  going  through  it  all,  while  I  sat 
here  with  my  hands  folded." 

He  did  not  respond  this  time  by  saying  how  she 
had  helped  him.  Our  romanticist  was  priding  him- 
self upon  being  a  man  of  decision  who  accepted  the 
inevitable;  an  automaton  who,  having  recognised 
the  mistake  of  having  a  heart  in  his  caste,  intended 
to  go  through  the  part  which  society  had  set  for 
him.  He  was  afraid  of  his  own  will;  so  afraid 
that  he  could  not  be  himself,  which  was  the  self 
that  she  knew  and  loved. 

79 


Lucy  of  the  Stars 

"Once  you  asked  me  to  sit  in  that  chair  while  you 
sat  in  this,"  he  said,  "in  order  that  we  might  be 
brave  and  grave  and  reasonable." 

"Yes,"  she  returned,  with  a  gasp;  and  then,  re- 
covering herself,  she  added:  "That  was  yours  and 
this  was  mine,  as  I  remember.     Pray,  be  seated." 

"When  I  came  to  you  from  Norway " — it 
seemed  to  him  that  he  was  saying  this  out  of  a  book 
— "I  did  not  know  life.  Then  I  thought  of  myself 
as  a  man  with  no  cares  and  three  thousand  a  year, 
who  was  one  day  coming  into  an  estate  which  en- 
joyed an  income  sufficient  for  all  rational  needs. 
Intentionally,  I  practised  no  deceit.  I  was  only  a 
youthful  abstraction  who  had  never  used  my  eyes 
at  Burbridge.  I  did  not  know  that  I  was  not  en- 
titled to  sixpence  a  year,  that  the  estate  was  bank- 
rupt.    Such  is  the  truth." 

Will  men  never  learn  that  while  they  are  making 
false  starts  woman's  prescience  has  already  run  the 
course  of  their  intentions  and  found  their  goal? 
Lucy  understood  before  he  had  finished  speaking 
that  he  was  making  an  excuse  rather  than  a  plea. 
She  closed  her  eyes  for  a  moment,  and  when  she 
opened  them  again  their  gaze  and  her  nerves 
were  steady. 

"Was  it  three  thousand?"  she  remarked.  "I 
did  not  ask.  Inventories  were  not  in  my  mind.  I 
was  in  another  gallery." 

80 


Dispensing  with  Plato 

Her  nettling  pride  brought  the  sentences  out 
with  an  aloofness  whose  softness  and  absence  of 
affectation  made  it  none  the  less  clear.  He  had 
scarcely  heard  her,  let  alone  observed  the  inflec- 
tions and  glances  by  which  a  woman  more  than  a 
man  forms  judgments.  Even  if  he  had  then  put 
on  the  brakes,  he  would  have  speeded  on  from  the 
momentum  of  his  false  determination.  He  drew 
from  his  pocket  his  father's  letter  and  gave  it  to 
her. 

"If  it  is  confidential  to  me,  it  is  also  confidential 
to  you,"  he  said.  No  act  of  his  that  afternoon 
meant  so  much  to  her  in  proof  of  his  manliness  as 
this.  "I  beg  of  you  to  read  it  through,"  he  con- 
tinued, "and  to  read  it  in  the  light  of  unselfishness, 
as  I  have  tried  to  read  it." 

She  turned  her  head  so  that  the  manuscript 
would  not  be  in  shadow.  Her  only  movement  was 
the  quivering  of  her  nostrils.  The  profile  realised 
no  artist's  ideal;  but  the  artist  who  could  have 
transferred  the  life  of  her  features  to  canvas  would 
have  made  a  marvellous  picture.  The  intensity  of 
concentration  which  she  showed  could  never  ap- 
pear upon  a  face  of  classic  outline.  He  looked  on 
her  only  to  feel  his  love  surging  back  with  desire 
for  possession.  To  him,  striving  as  he  was  to 
restrain  ancestral  weakness,  she  seemed  to  read 
with  a  deadly  slowness,  as  if  digesting  each  sen- 

81 


Lucy  of  the  Stars 

tence  before  she  went  on  to  the  next.  She  offered 
no  comment;  there  was  no  change  of  expression 
till  she  came  to  the  part  where  the  late  earl  wrote 
of  the  idea  of  "a  rich  marriage  for  you  .  .  . 
when    I   brought    Miss    Hodges   to    Burbridge." 

uCad!"  she  cried,  under  her  breath. 

He  was  dumfounded.  She,  the  woman  of  his 
heart,  was  saying  that  about  his  own  father !  Yet 
— yet — cad!  That  expressed  his  own  feeling 
about  parts  of  the  letter;  only  he  could  not  give 
the  thing  that  name. 

When  she  came  to  the  earl's  reflections  on 
Americans — the  Americans  from  whom  he  was  to 
draw  the  wealth  to  repair  the  fortunes  of  the 
Steadleys  by  a  marriage — she  spoke  above  her 
breath,  heedless  of  Carniston's  presence,  of  any- 
thing but  her  own  thoughts. 

"Cad  I"  she  cried  again.  "What  a  man's  in- 
most thoughts  are,  where  his  personal  interests  are 
concerned,  that  he  is.  The  Americans  may  love 
money.  It  means  power  and  promotion  to  them — 
it  meant  fear  to  him." 

"Cad!"  she  repeated,  for  the  third  time.  "This 
man  had  not  right  feelings.  They  are  the  greatest 
thing  in  the  world.  Thank  God  if  you  are  born 
with  them.  If  not,  try  to  transplant  them.  Inborn 
or  grafted,  be  true  to  them.  Then  you  may  close 
your  eyes  and  they  will  lead  you  straight." 

82 


Dispensing  with   Plato 

"He  was  my  father!"  Carniston  said  slowly. 

"Yes."  She  looked  up  as  she  spoke  the  word, 
and  then  went  on  reading.  He  knew  the  letter  by 
heart,  and  could  follow  her  in  every  line  and  keep 
the  pulse  of  her  feeling. 

"Coward — coward!"  she  exclaimed,  when  she 
laid  the  sheets  down.  "It  is  not  brave  simply  to 
die.  It  is  brave  to  live  and  fight."  Hers  was  not 
a  soul  to  be  in  sympathy  with  that  Eastern  phil- 
osophy which  teaches  death  when  by  dying  you 
can  best  serve  your  honour  and  your  family.  "He 
shifted  responsibility.  He  ran  away  from  the  bat- 
tle. He  would  not  remain  to  face  the  disaster 
which  his  folly  had  sown." 

"Oh,  Lucy — you — "  Carniston  cried.     "I " 

"Wait!"  she  said  coolly.  "I  have  yet  to  read 
the  postscript."  This  she  perused  with  the  same 
tantalising  deliberation. 

When  she  looked  up  her  face  was  like  ashes,  but 
her  voice  was  the  same  as  if  she  were  asking 
whether  he  would  have  one  lump  or  two. 

"When  do  you  sail,  Arthur?"  she  inquired. 

Think  now,  Carniston,  if  you  would  fight  with 
her  at  your  side  to  keep  Burbridge,  what  an  asset 
you  would  have  in  the  power  of  self-control  in  that 
small  frame! 

"I — I  don't  know,"  he  said  chokingly. 

She  rose  with  the  dignity  of  a  hostess  when  a 

83 


Lucy  of  the  Stars 

distinguished  guest  has  signified  his  intention  of 
going. 

"Of  course  there  are  steamers  almost  every  day 
now,  and  you  have  six  months  for  the  affair," 
she  said  lightly.  "That  is  ample,  according  to 
what  little  Lord  Dingwall  said.  He  married  the 
daughter  of  a  Western  miner  and  was  back  in 
England  in  half  the  time  that  you  have.  Your 
friends  do  not  expect  you  to  break  records,  per- 
haps, but  certainly  they  do  not  expect  you  to  be  a 
laggard." 

Suddenly  the  rush  of  manhood — which  is  the 
one  powerful  argument  man  has  where  the  affec- 
tions of  a  true  woman  are  concerned — took  a 
direction  beyond  his  control.  He  went  tow- 
ard her  imploringly;  indeed,  he  seemed  about  to 
kneel. 

"Lucy— I " 

She  smiled  at  him  with  the  mischief  of  old — the 
mischief  of  week-end  parties,  not  of  intimacy. 

"Arthur,  if  you  do  that" — and  she  did  manage 
to  keep  her  poise  and  not  to  say  that  he  would  open 
the  heart  which  she  had  sealed  and  bring  her  mis- 
ery which  only  her  pillow  should  know — "Miss 
Hodges  will  not  approve,  on  the  ground  of  your 
title,  of  noblesse  oblige  and  form." 

He  still  had  presence  of  mind  enough  to  see 
that  she  had  moved  toward  the  door.     As  she 

84 


Dispensing  with  Plato 

opened  it  he  started  to  proclaim  the  old  formula 
of  friendship  in  place  of  that  which  had  passed. 

"No,  Arthur,"  she  remonstrated.  "We  will 
dispense  with  Plato  as  superfluous  in  these  days  of 
high  finance.  Good-bye.  You  see  that  I  still  call 
you  Arthur." 

He  passed  out  in  a  daze  and  saw  before  him 
at  the  gate  a  creation  of  metal  with  leather  seats; 
and,  his  mind  growing  clearer,  he  realised  that  he 
knew  the  levers  to  shift  in  order  to  take  him  back 
to  Burb ridge  and  his  new  life. 

Lucy  was  a  heap  on  one  of  the  drawing-room 
chairs. 


85 


VIII 

BACK  TO  EARTH 

OH,"  she  thought,  "if  he  had  only  come  to  me 
with  his  face  flushed  and  his  eyes  shining 
and  said,  'Lucy,  it  is  too  late,  now  that  you  have 
entered  into  my  heart,  to  talk  to  me  of  duties  which 
were  my  father's  and  my  grandfather's,  not  mine. 
I  have  chosen  you.  You  are  greater  to  me  than 
Burbridge  or  peerdoms  or  the  heads  of  beasts  shot 
by  a  savage  ancestor.  I  want  you.  We  will  go  to 
the  colonies  together;  we  will  make  the  fight.' 

"The  worship  of  that!  The  joy  of  it!"  She 
lifted  her  head  from  her  pillow,  fairly  smiling 
through  her  tears.  "Then  it  would  have  been  my 
place  to  have  told  him  that  we  must  be  brave  and 
grave  and  reasonable.  He  should  have  left  that  to 
me,  at  least,"  she  quavered.  "I  would  have  bidden 
him  to  forget  me  and  face  his  responsibilities  and 
the  destiny  for  which  he  was  born.  I  would  have 
told  him  that  I  loved  him  too  well  to  stand  in 
his  way. 

"And  then — ah,  then,  if  he  had  suddenly  turned 
despondent  and  reproached  me,  and  said  that  now 

86 


Back  to  Earth 

that  he  had  no  fortune  and  his  title  was  a  barren 
one  I  no  longer  cared  for  him — then,  if  in  answer 
to  the  indignation  of  my  denial  he  had  come  to  me 
like  the  wind  and  thrown  his  arms  around  me — 
why,  I" — her  breath  came  in  long  gasps — "I  would 
have  given  him  up  smiling,  and  I  should  have 
known  that  he  was  mine;  and  I  should  have  had 
something  to  remember  always. 

"But  no!  Why,  when  he  was  so  business-like, 
did  he  not  save  himself  time  by  sending  his  solic- 
itor? He  tried  to  be  kind  to  this  Lucy  from  no- 
where and  to  soften  the  blow  with  an  introduction 
of  whereas  and  resolved.  And  the  letter  of  his 
cowardly  old  father  who  was  afraid  to  live  and 
face  bankruptcy  himself  and  so  left  his  son,  with 
his  blessing,  to  face  it !  Yet,  I  suppose  that  the  old 
earl  was  wise.  It  is  only  I  that  am  unwise.  He 
meant  to  be  kind.  He — he,  too,  liked  to  see  me 
act.  Arthur  was  kind.  There  is  nothing  quite  so 
cruel  as  kindness. 

"Did  Arthur  think  that  I  was  going  to  prolong 
that  interview  forever?  Did  he  think  that  I  could 
go  on  keeping  cool  the  whole  afternoon  when  I 
was  on  fire  inside?  Before  he  spoke  his  intention 
was  all  clear  to  me.  And  after  that,  when  he  knew 
that  I  knew — when  I  had  read  the  letter  which  he 
left  to  explain  for  him,  I  thought  that  he  was 
going  to  try  to  put  his  arms  around  me  and  kiss 

87 


Lucy  of  the  Stars 

me.  For  a  moment  he  lapsed  from  his  resolution; 
for  a  moment  he  wanted  me  again.  I  could  not  let 
him  come  near — I  could  not !  It  was  wise  that  I 
did  not.  When  a  man  only  wants  you  for  mo- 
ments, what  chasms  of  terror  the  between-times 
must  be — the  times  when  you  drop  from  the  stars 
to  the  earth !  He  will  learn  to  want  the  American 
for  moments — when  she  is  ready  for  the  opera, 
when  she  comes  down  to  dinner,  yes.  But  he  must 
want  me  for  all  time  and  forever,  or  there  could  be 
no  bargain — and  it's  vulgar  to  have  sentiments 
and  emotions  in  these  mechanical  days,  anyway." 

She  saw  how  he  looked  when  they  parted.  Her 
thoughts  followed  him  through  the  streets  in  his 
car.  By  this  time  she  estimated  he  must  be  out 
of  London.  Of  what  was  he  thinking?  Prob- 
ably that  he  was  well  clear  of  a  dilemma.  Then 
why  should  she  be  thinking  of  him?  She  was  a 
fool  to  do  so,  she  told  herself  abruptly  and  impe- 
riously. 

Thereupon  she  began  talking  nonsense  to  Boze, 
who  had  sat  through  the  gusts  of  human  passion 
with  the  nonchalance  of  a  bronze  dog  on  a  lawn 
in  a  hailstorm.  The  words  of  a  little  never-care 
French  song  began  to  run  "by  request"  through 
her  head.  She  went  to  the  piano  and  played  the 
air,  which  she  lightly  sang,  still  "by  request" — her 
own.    When  she  whirled  around  on  the  stool  after- 


Back  to  Earth 

wards  she  was  reminded  that  she  ought  to  go 
upstairs  and  answer  a  couple  of  notes  that  had 
come  that  morning.  As  she  rose  she  saw  a  glove 
— Carniston's  glove,  which  he  had  dropped. 

"I  will  send  it  by  parcels-post  to  my  lord,  the 
Earl  of  Carniston,"  she  said  laughingly.  But  she 
did  not.  She  pressed  it  out  carefully,  and  laid  it 
at  the  bottom  of  the  drawer  of  her  dressing-table 
under  some  dinner  and  dance  souvenirs. 

In  rising  from  her  writing-desk  she  turned  so 
that  she  caught  a  glimpse  of  herself  in  her  mirror, 
and  she  bent  closer  instinctively  as  if  she  would 
learn  whether  or  not  the  change  wrought  that  day 
in  her  was  visible  to  the  world. 

"My  father  must  not  know  that  I  have  been 
crying,"  she  thought;  "he  must  not  suspect  or  ask 
questions  or  ever  surmise  what  has  happened 
between  Arthur  and  me.  I've  never  had  much 
experience,  but  I  have  heard  that  cold  bandages 
are  good" — she  laughed  over  her  illusion — "when 
you  have  been  having  a  flirtation  with  a  member  of 
the  House  of  Peers." 

She  folded  a  towel  and  soaked  it  in  the  basin. 
Lying  very  still,  holding  the  compress  fast  to  her 
eyes,  she  started  to  sing  the  never-care  song  again, 
but  it  died  on  her  lips  and  her  thoughts  soon 
gained  such  headway  that  she  was  repeating  them 
half  aloud. 

89 


Lucy  of  the  Stars 

"My  heart  is  all  my  father's  again,"  she  said, 
"and  it  is  his  in  a  way  that  it  never  was  before. 
I  am  back  to  earth.  I  wonder  if  the  lady  of  the 
portrait  found  that  he  had  no  fortune  or  if  she 
met  a  man  with  a  title  before  she  died.  I  am  glad 
that  I  don't  know.  I  am  glad  that  he  never  told 
me.  After  my  own  lesson  I  see  how  it  is  that  there 
may  be  some  secrets  which  you  want  to  share  with 
nobody.  It  was  my  place  to  trust  father,  not  to 
doubt,  not  to  ask.  He  is  right  and  good,  and  if 
he  has  a  secret  it  is  right  and  good  that  he  should 
keep  it. 

"Can  I,  who  have  sounded  that  thing — that 
thing  which  he  has  sounded — remain  as  sweet- 
tempered  as  he  is?  I  will  work  with  him  in  his 
laboratory.  I  am  Lucy  from  nowhere,  and  I  am 
glad  of  the  nowhere  because  my  father  came  from 
there.  I  was  Lucy  from  somewhere  long  enough 
to  know  that  somewhere  is  a  place  of  landslides, 
earthquakes,  volcanoes  and  lies;  and  they  shan't 
call  me  out  of  nowhere  to  amuse  them. 

"Still,  not  to  dance  or  play  or  go  to  week-ends 
— that  keeps  the  ghosts  out;  it  makes  turnings  in 
the  road ;  it  makes  you  forget.  No,  I'll  not  go  any 
more.  Why  am  I  afraid?  Am  I  such  a  fool  that 
I  cannot  forget  that  a  young  man  proposed  to  me 
and  I  accepted  him  all  on  an  early  autumn  after- 
noon just  at  dusk,  when  romance  was  in  the  air, 

90 


Back  to  Earth 

and  by  the  light  of  day  in  banking  hours  we  broke 
off  the  engagement?  Why,  that  is  happening  all 
over  England  every  day  without  materially  affect- 
ing the  death  statistics  from  syncope.  I  don't  see 
how  father  keeps  that  photograph  if  my  mother 
broke  his  heart,  as  I  believe  she  did.  I  want  noth- 
ing to  make  me  think  of  Arthur." 
But  the  glove,  Lucy! 


9i 


IX 

CASTING  OUT  FRACTIONS 

THE  room  where  the  hat  and  the  carbine  and 
the  portrait  of  the  lady  hung,  properly 
speaking,  was  more  of  a  library  and  lounging- 
room  than  a  study.  On  the  shelves  which  ran 
from  a  row  of  drawers  on  the  floor  to  the  ceiling 
were  books  in  the  five  languages  which  Dr.  von 
Kar  read.  Many  were  old,  bound  in  morocco  and 
stamped  with  coats  of  arms. 

The  doctor  seated  himself  here  regularly  before 
retiring,  to  write  in  his  diary,  one  of  the  old  cus- 
toms to  which  he  adhered  sacredly,  and  to  write 
such  letters  as  were  not  of  a  professional  or  a  busi- 
ness nature ;  and  here,  on  the  evenings  when  he  was 
in  the  mood  for  reading  for  pleasure's  sake,  he 
turned  the  pages  of  his  favourite  authors,  the 
prime  favourite  being  Cervantes,  and  in  order 
after  the  Spaniard,  Dante,  Horace,  Heine,  the 
Iliad,  and  La  Fontaine.  Any  one  who  sought  to 
draw  a  line  on  his  mind  or  his  character  from  this 
list  was  sadly  mixed. 

92 


Casting  Out  Fractions 

"I  could  not  help  learning  French  and  German 
when  I  was  a  child,"  he  said  in  answer  to  any 
compliments  on  his  acquirements.  "English  I 
could  not  speak  fluently  at  all  when  I  came  to  Eng- 
land. Italian  and  Spanish  I  speak  illy,  although 
I  read  them  well  enough.  Languages  are  a  power 
in  yourself  for  yourself  which  have  the  fault  of 
dimming  the  creative  faculty  and  making  you  rely 
on  others'  brains  instead  of  your  own.  To  me  they 
serve  the  mind  as  moving-picture  machines  serve 
the  eye.  I  can  come  in  here  in  the  evening  and  for 
an  hour  be  a  Greek,  a  German,  or  a  Frenchman  of 
the  last  century  or  the  century  before,  and  travel 
the  orbit  of  his  thought  and  experience,  and  then 
go  to  bed  in  London  as  usual." 

The  farther  door,  itself  a  part  of  the  book-lined 
wall,  opened  out  of  the  library  into  what  the  doc- 
tor was  pleased  to  call  the  "home  shop,"  in  con- 
tradistinction to  the  "city  shop."  This  consisted 
of  one  vast  room  which  had  been  built  onto  the 
old  mansion  as  an  ell.  It  was  fitted  with  all  the 
apparatus  of  a  modern  laboratory.  By  both  the 
east  window,  to  catch  the  morning  light,  and  the 
west  window,  to  catch  the  afternoon  sun,  was  a 
high  desk  such  as  bookkeepers  use.  When  he  was 
writing  reports  or  making  calculations  he  alter- 
nated between  the  two,  according  to  the  time  of 
day. 

93 


Lucy  of  the  Stars 

A  total  absence  of  chairs  was  discouraging  to 
the  type  of  caller  who  announces  his  intention  of 
staying  forever  by  saying  that  he  really  must  be 
going.  The  doctor  was  a  prodigious  worker,  who 
valued  the  disposition  of  his  time  according  to  his 
own  programme.  If  he  wished  you  to  remain  for 
a  chat  he  conducted  you  to  the  door  in  the  book- 
wall.  When  one  of  his  friends  told  another  that 
he  had  been  calling  on  the  doctor,  the  inevitable 
query  was,  "Library  or  shop?"  Young  scientists, 
when  they  had  anything  which  they  thought  would 
interest  him,  went  in  the  hope  of  "library,"  and 
the  rarity  of  this  condescension  had  to  them  the 
value  of  a  royal  decoration. 

On  the  afternoon  of  Carniston's  visit  to  Lucy  the 
doctor  had  returned  early  from  the  City,  with  an 
unusual  light  in  his  calm  face  and  an  unusual 
springiness  in  his  step. 

"Young  Steadley's  motor,  I  think,"  he  observed, 
as  he  entered  the  gate.  "He  seems  to  be  coming 
here  pretty  often,  and  to  see  Lucie  and  not  me. 
Hm-m-m — I  wonder " 

However,  he  did  not  wonder  long.  He  was 
too  much  engrossed  in  other  things  to  be  drawn 
off  at  any  tangent  of  passing  speculation.  This 
had  been  a  famous  day  in  the  career  of  a  certain 
"working  chemist  and  something  of  an  inventor." 
After  a  business  consultation  at  luncheon  he  had 

94 


Casting  Out  Fractions 

signed  a  contract  with  an  American  capitalist, 
Lindley  Belmore,  for  the  erection  at  Kearn's 
Ford  of  an  extensive  works  for  the  manufac- 
ture of  his  new  roofing  material;  and  on  this 
account  he  was  about  to  go  to  America  for  the 
first  time. 

It  is  on  an  occasion  like  this,  when  one  has 
brought  some  plan  to  a  happy  conclusion,  that,  in 
the  extending  glow  of  his  satisfaction,  he  looks 
back  on  the  sum  of  his  victories  or  of  his  good 
deeds,  or  counts  his  fortune.  The  doctor  could 
the  better  enjoy  the  review  of  his  successes  be- 
cause their  nature  and  extent  were  known  only  to 
himself. 

His  friends  had  so  far  taken  everything  with 
the  doctor  for  granted,  as  he  wished  they  should, 
that  they  had  never  considered  that  his  manner  of 
living  in  an  unfashionable  part  of  London,  the  ex- 
cellence of  his  cookery,  and  the  delicacy  of  his 
wines  represented  an  expense  which  would  have 
maintained  a  first-class  house  in  the  West  End  well 
within  the  accepted  standards  of  living  there. 
Never,  indeed,  had  it  occurred  to  Lucy,  such  was 
the  art  with  which  her  father  managed  her  on  this 
score,  that  the  bills  for  her  gowns  could  scarcely 
be  included  in  the  income  of  the  average  "working 
chemist  and  something  of  an  inventor."  "Possibly 
you  would  like  a  new  frock,  ma  cherie"  he  would 

95 


Lucy  of  the  Stars 

say.  "Well,  I  think  we  can  afford  it" — after  some 
thought.  It  would  scarcely  be  fair  to  say  that  he 
was  as  proud  of  his  success  in  business  as  he  was 
of  his  researches  and  his  taste  in  imaginative  litera- 
ture. Cervantes  was  the  greatest  prose  writer  who 
ever  lived,  of  course. 

Now  he  bent  over  the  high  desk  at  the  west  with 
the  evening  sun  on  his  gray  head,  his  pencil  set- 
ting down  the  values  of  the  different  properties 
which  he  had  accumulated  since  he  had  concluded 
that  he  was  living  in  "the  age  of  steam  and  prac- 
tical politics."  When  he  had  made  a  total  of  low 
estimates  he  cast  out  the  fractions,  and  there  re- 
mained a  fortune  of  three  hundred  thousand 
pounds,  with  an  annual  income,  including  royalties, 
of  thirty  thousand. 

"For  a  man  who  was  a  romanticist  until  he  was 
forty,  I  haven't  done  so  badly,"  he  mused. 

He  would  have  been  the  last  man  in  the  world 
to  think  of  himself  as  a  miser.  Least  of  all  would 
he  have  thought  of  himself  as  playing  a  part 
suited  to  a  melodrama.  Consciousness  of  a  schol- 
arly breadth  of  view  had  made  his  drift  the  easier. 
As  he  tore  the  memorandum  into  extremely  small 
bits  and  let  it  fall  into  the  basket  he  was  back 
again  with  the  lady  of  the  portrait.  There  had 
been  a  time  when  the  only  three  things  in  the 
world  to  him  were  books  and  love  and  fighting. 

96 


Casting  Out  Fractions 

As  for  money,  put  your  hand  in  your  pocket  and 
if  there  was  none — what  would  you? 

Then  came  a  day  when  the  need  of  money 
awakened  him,  and  he  found  himself  left  alone  in 
the  world  with  Lucy  and  poverty  and  a  resolution. 
He  would  never  be  caught  penniless  again,  he 
determined.  This  was  for  her  sake,  but  she  was 
not  to  know  it.  The  ingenuity  that  this  brilliant 
man  had  shown  as  a  soldier  was  turned  to  the  con- 
servation of  energy  as  a  scientist  and  an  inventor. 
No  one  except  himself  knew  or  even  suspected  the 
amount  of  his  wealth.  So  vast  is  London,  so  many 
are  the  fortunes  centered  there  to-day,  that  it  is  the 
easiest  of  financial  wildernesses  in  which  to  con- 
ceal one.  Belmore  knew  of  the  roofing  material; 
others  knew  of  the  gaslight  mantle,  the  smoke 
consumer,  and  other  inventions  which,  by  his 
choice,  did  not  bear  his  name. 

He  had  been  amazed  himself  of  late  by  the 
rapidity  of  the  accumulation,  which  had  made  him 
a  little  more  contemptuous  of  that  thing  which  had 
destroyed  his  happiness  in  youth.  Meanwhile,  he 
had  taken  care  that  Lucy  should  never  think  of 
money.  The  side  of  him  which  she  saw  was  that 
of  the  library  where  he  communed  with  his  friend 
Don  Quixote.  More  than  once  he  had  told  her 
that,  according  to  his  romantic,  old-world  notions, 
an  only  daughter  ought  not  to  know  how  to  add 

97 


Lucy  of  the  Stars 


and  subtract.  A  fortune  should  be  to  her  as  a 
blessing,  and  not  as  an  object  for  living.  His  joy- 
in  its  possession  was  that  it  made  her  safe.  Such 
was  the  rule  of  life  he  had  fastened  on  himself  for 
want  of  the  check  of  intimate  criticism. 

He  was  thinking  how  he  could  spend  a  liberal 
sum  on  his  holiday  without  Lucy  suspecting  that 
he  had  more  than  a  modest  income,  when,  happen- 
ing to  look  out  of  the  window,  he  saw  that  the 
automobile  was  gone.  This  brought  to  mind  again 
the  frequency  of  the  earl's  visits;  and  following 
that  train  of  thought  arose  all  the  dangers  that 
lay  in  Lucy's  position,  without  any  mother  to 
advise  her  when  she  was  at  a  marriageable  age. 

"It  must  come  some  day,"  he  told  himself. 
"Young  Steadley — and  he  has  come  into  his  title 
now,  of  course — I  like.  He  is  straightforward, 
and  will  mature  into  solidity.  Lucie  does  not  need 
a  mercurial  husband.  If  his  estate  should  be  crip- 
pled, as  most  great  estates  are  in  these  days,  why, 
I  have  ample  to  put  it  into  shape.  But — no !  My 
fortune  is  not  to  be  thought  of  in  that  way.  He 
must  come  to  her  for  herself,  and  she  must  come 
to  me  with  him.  Afterwards,  my  all  is  theirs ;  but 
not  before — no,  not  before !  I  know  by  expe- 
rience— and  that  thing  shall  not  happen  to  her." 

Here  his  face  took  on  an  almost  savage  expres- 
sion, and  under  his  contracted  eyebrows  the  keen 

98 


Casting  Out  Fractions 

gray  eyes  could  see  the  hat  and  the  carbine  and 
the  portrait  of  the  lady  as  plainly  as  if  he  were 
at  the  desk  in  the  library. 

"What  folly!"  he  said,  rallying  himself.  "She 
is  only  twenty-one.  How  she  would  laugh  at  me 
for  my  thoughts!  She  is  transparent  as  crystal. 
I  shall  know  soon  enough  when  her  affection  is 
placed." 

It  occurred  to  him  then  that  he  had  not  yet  told 
Lucy  the  news.  He  had  come  home  early  partly 
on  that  account,  and  he  was  going  to  her  when  he 
saw  Lord  Brent's  carriage. 

"The  old  dilettante  has  some  pamphlet  which 
I  have  already  seen,"  the  doctor  muttered.  "In 
coaching  days,  before  the  telegraph,  he  would  have 
been  more  useful." 

Lord  Brent  mingled  science  and  gossip  affably. 
Scientists  took  his  science  for  gossip,  and  gossips 
his  gossip  for  science.  After  a  weighty  considera- 
tion of  the  affair  he  had  decided,  such  was  his  trust 
in  the  doctor's  good  sense,  to  approach  him  on  the 
subject  of  the  information  which  he  had  received 
from  Carniston. 

"Ah,  von  Kar,"  he  said  as  he  entered,  "having 
a  moment  to  spare — and  only  a  moment  I  find  on 
looking  at  my  watch — I  drove  over  to  pass  the 
time  of  day  and  to  show  you  a  pamphlet  by  Dr. 
Werner  of  Vienna,  involving  the  results  of  his  in- 

99 


Lucy  of  the  Stars 

vestigation  of  the  phenomenon  of  a  bird  keeping 
its  grasp  on  its  perch  or  a  bat  on  a  rafter  when 
asleep." 

"Yes,  I  have  wanted  to  see  it,"  said  the  doctor, 
who  had  had  it  on  file  for  a  week. 

"There  is  another  subject  I  purpose  calling  to 
your  attention,"  Lord  Brent  continued.  "I  think 
that  you  know  my  views  on  marriage,  which,  I 
have  always  held,  should  be  a  matter  of  scientific 
adjustment  rather  than  mere  temporary  emotional 
attachment.     Therefore,  I  am  led  to " 

The  doctor  foresaw  a  disquisition. 

"Yes,  I  remember,"  he  said.  "You  had  a  letter 
in  The  Times.  Er — I  was  about  to  tell  you  some 
news  of  myself." 

Brent  pricked  his  ears  at  once.  If  he  had  been 
born  the  son  of  a  clergyman  instead  of  a  peer  he 
would  probably  have  been  a  journalist. 

"I  am  going  for  a  little  tour  to  America,"  the 
doctor  added;  and  Brent  began  a  homily  on 
America. 

"You  will  have  to  put  up  with  some  discomforts, 
so  my  friends  who  have  been  there  tell  me.  It  will 
be  a  change  and  enjoyable,  no  doubt.  America  has 
done  some  good  work,  especially  in  palaeontology. 
However,  the  Americans  come  to  us ;  we  never  go 
to  them.  This  will  be  true,  even  after  the  Yankees 
and  the  Russians  have  swallowed  us,  as  surely  as 

ioo 


Casting  Out  Fractions 

the  Romans  of  the  Empire  sent  their  sons  to  school 
in  Athens.  Ours  is  the  intellect  and  the  settled 
standard  of  culture.  But  when  do  you  sail,  my 
dear  von  Kar?" 

"On  the  Oceanic,  Wednesday  week." 

"Ah,  we  must  have  ten  or  a  dozen  choice  spirits 
for  luncheon  at  the  Mowbray — ah — Tuesday 
week — at  one  o'clock,  shall  we  say?" 

Lord  Brent  was  a  born  host  at  his  own  table, 
where  and  where  alone  he  personally  forewent 
generalities  while  he  so  directed  those  of  his  guests 
that  each  of  them  thought  his  theories  proved. 
When  he  went  to  other  people's  dinners  he  had 
an  unfortunate  habit,  after  refusing  coffee  on  the 
ground  that  it  kept  him  awake,  of  falling  sound 
asleep,  evidently  on  the  hypothesis  that  he  was  off 
duty  that  night. 

"That  is  settled,  then,"  he  concluded.  "I  will 
have  some  letters  for  you,  too." 

If  a  friend  were  only  crossing  the  Channel, 
Brent  presented  him  with  a  sheaf  of  introductions; 
for  he  knew  almost  all  the  important  scientific  men 
in  the  world  without  their  knowing  exactly  what 
important  scientific  work  he  himself  had  done. 
With  the  menu  for  his  luncheon  to  arrange — a 
thing  that  he  always  did  in  person  on  scientific 
principles  which  were  certainly  agreeable  to  the 
digestion — he   quite   overlooked  speaking  to   the 

IOI 


Lucy  of  the  Stars 


doctor  upon  what  was,  at  the  best,  a  delicate 
matter.  If  he  had  not,  again  the  novelist  might 
have  been  without  a  plot. 

The  doctor  saw  his  guest  to  the  door,  and  then 
sought  Lucy,  who,  with  the  bandage  off  her  eyes 
and  full  of  courage,  was  coming  to  him. 

"Was  it  Carniston's  car  that  I  saw  at  the  gate 
when  I  came  in?"  he  began. 

"Oh,  yes,"  she  answered  easily.  But  his  ques- 
tion had  set  all  the  little  devils  of  self-conscious- 
ness dancing  in  her  brain.  Had  he  overheard 
anything?  Had  he  surmised  anything?  Fresh 
from  that  scene  which  had  seemed  so  mighty  as 
to  embrace  the  universe,  her  suspicions  were  quick; 
and  the  one  thing  she  had  determined  was  that  her 
father's  happiness  should  suffer  no  shock  from  the 
knowledge  of  that  incident,  which  was  closed 
beyond  his  or  any  worldly  assistance. 

"Yes,"  she  ran  on  rapidly,  "he  had  been  two  or 
three  hours  with  his  solicitor,  and  stopped  over  on 
the  way  home  for  tea.  He  says  that  one  gets  no 
such  tea  anywhere  in  London  as  ours — a  compli- 
ment we  owe  to  that  friend  of  yours,  the  China 
merchant.  The  young  earl  is  very  amiable  and 
much  impressed  with  his  responsibilities.  He  is 
going  to  travel  for  a  time  in  order  to  rest.  His 
father's  death  was  a  great  shock.  He  came  to  say 
good-bye  to  us  both,  and  we  had  no  idea  that  you 

102 


Casting  Out  Fractions 

were  home  so  early.  I  think  I  know  the  girl  he  is 
going  to  marry,  and  I  expect  that  the  engagement 
will  be  announced  when  he  returns." 

Lucy  felt  that  if  she  was  not  speaking  a  lie 
direct,  she  was  acting  one.  Are  such  lies  wrong? 
Are  they  wrong  if  they  bring  the  result  you  desire? 
The  doctor  smiled  happily,  all  thought  of  anything 
more  than  simple  acquaintanceship  between  her  and 
Carniston  having  passed. 

"Lucie,  I  have  had  quite  a  piece  of  luck — for  a 
poor  working  chemist." 

"And  something  of  an  inventor,"  she  put  in 
laughingly. 

"Ah,  you  know  all  your  father's  pet  phrases, 
and  now  that  his  hair  is  white  he  repeats  his  old 
ones  instead  of  coining  new  ones.  I  wonder  if  I 
am  such  a  bore  that  you  will  not  go  with  me  to 
America,  where  I  have  to  supervise  the  building 
of  a  manufactory?" 

"Do  you  mean  it?"  she  cried,  putting  her  hands 
on  his  shoulders. 

"Yes,  on  Wednesday  week,  on  the  Oceanic." 

She  threw  her  arms  around  his  neck  and  hugged 
him  and  called  him  all  the  dear  names  in  her  rich 
vocabulary. 

"Do  you  know,  daddy,"  she  said,  as  they  drank 
their  tea  together  and  made  their  plans,  "this  helps 
me  to  escape  from  a  lot  of  stupid  engagements. 

103 


Lucy  of  the  Stars 

I  think  that  I  have  pretty  well  analysed  society,  and 
I  am  about  ready  to  set  down  my  observations  and 
conclusions,  as  you  would  say.  I  have  been  tread- 
ing in  a  circle,  and  have  felt  as  if  I  were  on  a  mov- 
ing train  and  could  not  step  off  even  if  I  wanted  to. 
You  have  given  me  the  opportunity.  When  I 
come  back  I  want  to  settle  down  to  work  with  you, 
and  I  am  going  to  ask  you  to  give  up  your  scientific 
dinners  and  dine  at  home  with  me  and  Don 
Quixote  and  the  noble  Boze." 

The  doctor  beamed.  It  was,  indeed,  a  day  of 
beams  for  him.  The  sharp  little  fear  of  increas- 
ing estrangement  which  had  been  growing  in  his 
heart  passed  away. 

"Possibly  my  Lucie  is  not  a  marrying  girl,  after 
all,"  he  thought.  "I  am  glad  for  my  own  selfish 
sake,  and  I  am  glad,  too,  for  hers,  although  it  is 
against  nature;  for  I  know  her  blood,  and  know 
that  if  she  did  love,  it  would  be  intensely." 

"We  are  going  to  America,  you  and  I,  father!" 
From  the  piano  she  looked  over  her  shoulder  at 
him  and  mischievously  said,  "Comrades!"  before 
she  sang: 

"  'You  and  I,  dear,  buckling  on  our  swords  before  the  light, 
With  the  songs  we  sing  to  aid  the  merry  sunbeams'  flight, 

Never  care,  never  care! 
Panoplied  in  armour  of  the  rosy,  breaking  day, 
See  us  start  to  slash  a  path  across  the  Milky  Way, 
Never  care,  never  care!'  " 
IO4 


Casting  Out  Fractions 

Who  was  this  joining  in  the  refrain  of  the  new- 
song  whose  words  had  flashed  into  her  mind  as 
some  expression  of  the  release  from  bondage  which 
travel  in  a  strange  land  meant  to  her  at  that  mo- 
ment? None  other  than  the  venerable  "working 
chemist  and  something  of  an  inventor,"  who  made 
occasional  journeys  not  only  into  the  realms  of  ab- 
stract science  and  practical  finance,  but  into  those 
of  Don  Quixote.  They  caught  themselves  hum- 
ming these  never-care  songs,  some  of  them  Lucy's 
own,  more  of  them  chansons  of  France,  between 
the  courses  at  dinner;  and  they  sat  up  till  late  in 
the  free  comradeship  of  old  days. 

The  supremely  happy  father,  when  he  went  up- 
stairs, was  congratulating  himself  on  his  finesse  in 
telling  Lucy  that  he  had  had  a  little  piece  of  luck 
which  enabled  him  to  spend  money  on  her  without 
the  risk  that  she  would  suspect  his  wealth. 

When  Lucy  found  herself  in  the  stillness  of  her 
room  the  ghosts  which  she  had  banished  came 
back.  Were  they  always  to  be  with  her  when  she 
was  alone  ?  Her  glance  fell  on  the  two  notes  on  her 
writing-table.  One  of  the  invitations  which  she  had 
declined  was  from  Mrs.  Bainbridge,  in  Kent.  She 
could  go  down  on  a  late  Saturday  train  and  return 
on  an  early  Monday  train.  Over  Sunday  she  could 
do  nothing  in  the  way  of  preparation.  She  tore 
up  the  refusal  and  sent  an  acceptance. 

105 


Lucy  of  the  Stars 

If  you  had  only  known,  Lucy,  that  in  your 
father's  safe-deposit  vault  at  your  call  were  enough 
credits  to  balance  all  the  Carniston  debits  and 
more !  Be  it  a  good  or  a  bad  lie  which  you  told 
him,  your  last  thought,  as  you  passed  into  fitful 
slumber,  was  to  your  honour: 

"I've  made  father  very  happy.  I — I  don't 
count.     I've  played  and  lost." 


106 


X 

NO  CIRCLES  FOR  THE   SHORE 

WHEN  a  girl  is  going  on  such  a  long  journey 
as  you  are,  I  fancy  she  would  like  some 
frocks,"  said  the  doctor  to  Lucy  at  the  breakfast- 
table. 

He  had  awakened  even  happier  than  when  he 
had  fallen  asleep,  and  he  had  grown  happier  as  he 
dressed  and  with  the  passage  of  each  minute,  as 
his  imagination  ranged  over  the  widening  prospect 
of  his  coming  holiday.  The  harness  was  off  and 
there  came  over  him  a  boyish  desire  to  begin  play- 
ing in  the  new  fields  at  once.  If  we  digress  here 
a  little,  it  is  the  doctor's  fault  primarily,  Madame 
Celestin's  secondarily;  and,  moreover,  the  gowns 
were  to  play  their  part  in  America,  too. 

"If  my  memory  and  sense  of  association  serve 
me  right,  the  place  for  frocks  is  Paris.  Then, 
when  one  has  had  a  little  piece  of  luck,  why  not 
spend  some  of  it  on  frocks?  The  truth  is,  in  view 
of  the  expected  arrangement  with  Belmore,  I  have 
been  quietly  making  my  own  preparations  for  a 

107 


Lucy  of  the  Stars 

week  or  more.  Besides,  my  affairs  are  very  sim- 
ple. Really,  I  could  be  ready  to  go  aboard  to- 
morrow. Now  that  I  have  made  up  my  mind  to 
travel" — a  deal  of  circumlocution  is  necessary,  it 
seems,  doctor,  in  order  to  remain  consistent  when 
one  has  had  a  little  piece  of  luck! — "I  find  myself 
restless  to  begin.  We  have  ten  days  yet.  We  can 
run  over  to  Paris  before  we  sail." 

Was  there  ever  any  girl  who  could  resist  buying 
frocks  ?  After  all,  is  any  sober  matron  sorry  in  her 
heart  that  Eve  took  to  the  fig-leaf,  that  basis  for 
elaboration  which,  more  than  the  apple  these  days, 
is  responsible  for  the  downfall  of  man?  You, 
madam,  who  bear  the  stamp  of  sex-emancipation 
on  your  forehead  where  your  hair  is  brushed 
straight  back,  have  you  never  looked  into  a  win- 
dow where  the  draped  models  call  and  not  wanted 
to  hear  the  rustle  of  the  silk  of  this  or  that  train 
behind  you? 

With  Lucy  there  was  no  hesitation.  Still  an- 
other note  was  written  to  Mrs.  Bainbridge,  in 
Kent,  whose  modest  early  autumn  party  meant 
nothing  in  keeping  ghosts  out  of  one's  mind  be- 
side the  privilege  of  spending  two  thousand  francs 
— for  that  was  the  amount  the  doctor  had  allowed 
— at  Madame  Celestin's. 

There  was  also  a  Monsieur  Celestin.  You  saw 
him  in  the  Bois  in  the  afternoon  in  Madame's  car- 

108 


No  Circles  for  the  Shore 

riage.  Some  rumours  said  that  at  other  times  he 
was  wrapped  in  cotton,  with  one  hand  free  in  order 
that  he  might  indulge  his  passion  for  chocolate 
caramels,  while  other  rumours  said  that  he  was 
occupied  in  the  basement  curling  his  moustache. 

Lucy  went  to  Madame  Celestin's,  not  command- 
ingly,  but  with  an  open  heart.  Candidly  in  French 
— and  what  a  language  French  is ! — she  told  Ma- 
dame of  a  little  piece  of  luck  which  had  befallen 
her  father,  who  was  a  poor  scholar,  and  how  she 
was  going  on  a  journey  where  she  might  have  to 
wear  nice  gowns,  and  how  she  wanted  Madame's 
kind  assistance.  Nor  was  it  so  much  what  she  said 
as  the  way  she  said  it  that  gained  her  object. 

"You  see,"  she  explained,  with  a  moue,  "  I  am 
not  as  tall  as  the  Venus  de  Milo,  who  was  dressed 
only  with  the  shadow  of  her  hands — and  now  she 
has  lost  the  hands,  poor  thing!  No,  no!  I  am 
not  like  the  Venus  at  all."  How  quick  Madame's 
overhearing  girls  were  to  understand  that!  They 
had  seen  the  Venus  in  the  Louvre.  Theirs  was 
an  experience  which  taught  them  that  many  women 
thought  they  were  Venuses,  when  the  very  fact 
that  they  were  not  explained  the  existence  of  dress- 
makers. 

"I  mustn't  have  a  gown  to  make  me  look  big," 
Lucy  continued,  ufor  then  I  would  look  smaller 
than  ever.    I  want  a  gown  for  me,  you  see,  and  I 

109 


Lucy  of  the  Stars 

am  bold  enough  to  come  to  the  foremost  artiste 
and  ask  her  to  make  a  gown  for  me." 

The  French  are  supposed  to  have  no  real  heart 
sympathy;  to  have  only  politeness.  But  a  neigh- 
bour who  has  no  knowledge  of  a  neighbour's  lan- 
guage is  always  misunderstanding  that  neighbour. 
Say,  if  you  will,  that  the  French  become  en  rapport 
when  they  show  unselfish  enthusiasm.  That,  of 
course,  is  not  sympathy — not  even  when  it  is  called 
la  sympathie. 

The  girls  of  Celestin's,  then,  were  en  rapport 
with  Lucy,  and  likewise  Madame  herself,  with 
reservations  which  were  trained  rather  than  in- 
herent. Her  little  moustache  of  black  and  her  air 
of  being  a  diplomatist  before  and  a  martinet  behind 
the  scenes  had  come  with  age  and  with  success 
which  she  valued  more  and  more.  It  was  a  short 
time  to  fill  an  order,  but  they  would  undertake 
it  especially  on  Lucy's  account.  This  from  Ma- 
dame Celestin  and  not  the  girls,  who  knew  that 
she  would  have  said  the  same  to  anybody.  Their 
sympathies  were  all  with  Monsieur. 

"Then  behold  what  you  have  to  build  on,"  said 
Lucy,  with  a  downward  sweep  of  her  hands,  uand 
the  sum  is  two  thousand  francs  and  the  frocks  a 
simple  morning  and  an  afternoon  and  one  evening 
gown." 

There  was  a  movement  of  the  big  screen  which 
no 


No  Circles  for  the  Shore 

hid  the  stairway  into  the  basement,  and  from  be- 
hind it  sprang  none  other  than  Monsieur  Celestin 
himself  with  the  energy  of  a  cavalry  leader  in 
action,  only  instead  of  a  sabre  he  had  a  pad  and 
a  pencil;  for  both  groups  of  gossip-mongers  were 
wrong,  and  we  should  say  that  the  creative  talent 
of  the  house  of  Celestin  was  masculine  if  we  were 
sure  that  Monsieur  would  consider  that  a  compli- 
ment, and  judging  by  the  way  he  swore  on  occasion 
he  might. 

Not  knowing  what  else  to  do,  Lucy  made  the 
family  apparition  a  bow,  which  he  returned  with 
one  as  profound  as  if  the  President  of  the  Republic 
were  making  him  a  Chevalier  of  the  Legion. 

"Mademoiselle,  you  have  a  soul!"  he  cried,  as 
he  moved  about  her,  rapturously  observing  the  fine 
proportions  of  her  slight  figure.  "You  are  a  wom- 
an— a  woman,  Mademoiselle" — this  Monsieur 
shouted  as  if  in  face  of  vigorous  denials — "a 
woman  and  not  a  model  like  those  in  the  windows. 
You  cannot  imagine,  Mademoiselle,  what  a  pleas- 
ure it  is  to  me  to  meet  a  woman !  When  I  do  meet 
one  I  come  out  from  behind  the  screen.  No  more 
than  an  artist  would  decorate  a  room  till  he  has 
seen  it,  no  more  should  an  artist  create  a  gown  till 
he  has  seen  the  woman  who  is  to  wear  it.  The 
more  the  woman  appreciates  this,  the  greater  the 
artist's  inspiration,   the  greater  the  gown.     The 

m 


Lucy  of  the  Stars 

wearer  is  the  theme.  This  little  girl  knows  this 
herself,"  he  observed  with  pedagogic  insistence  to 
all  present.  "She  knew  out  of  her  nature  without 
being  told.  Wonderful!  I  see — I  see,"  he  cried, 
rising  on  tiptoe  and  tapping  his  head  with  a  finger, 
"I  see  three  gowns  for  five  thousand  francs!" 

"Two!"  put  in  Lucy  quickly.  She  was  fright- 
ened at  the  price,  as  it  was ;  and  yet  she  could  not 
resist  the  temptation  her  father  offered. 

Monsieur  did  not  know  that  Dr.  von  Kar 
had  taken  Madame  to  one  side  and  whispered 
that  other  three — "entre  nous" — into  Madame's 
ear. 

"Two !"  he  said.  What  did  it  matter  if  he  lost 
a  little!  At  all  events,  he  would  carry  out  his 
artistic  conceptions.  If  Monsieur  had  been  in 
charge  of  the  management  of  the  shop  he  would 
have  ruined  it  financially  in  six  months.  "When 
the  world  sees  that  evening  gown,  Mademoiselle," 
he  proceeded,  "they  will  not  say,  What  lace!  what 
diamonds!'  No,  they  will  say,  'What  a  woman!' 
They  will  say,  'What  a  gown!'  afterwards.  It  is 
because  they  say  it  afterwards — that  is  the  compli- 
ment to  the  gown.  Thank  you,  Mademoiselle,  for 
honouring  me.  Madame's  seamstresses  shall  ac- 
complish the  task  and  have  all  ready  by  Thursday 
if  they  have  to  work  their  fingers  off.  Lace?  I 
will  cut  it  and  play  with  it  as  if  it  were  tissue  paper. 

112 


No  Circles  for  the  Shore 

Good  morning,  Mademoiselle.  Thank  you  for 
this  honour." 

One  complaint  of  their  customers  was  the 
amount  of  trying  on  which  Celestin's  required,  but 
the  results  made  them  overlook  this.  In  the  large 
fitting-room  reserved  for  the  highly  favored  Ma- 
dame always  presided  with  the  eye  of  artistic 
finality.  The  real  eye,  however,  looked  through 
a  hole  in  the  wall  behind  the  palm  which  stood 
in  the  corner,  and  when  the  subject  was  asked  to 
turn  around  it  was  for  Monsieur's  not  Madame's 
benefit.  The  girls  were  amazed  at  the  extraor- 
dinary manifestation  of  Monsieur  on  Lucy's  be- 
half. They  gasped  and  looked  at  Madame,  the 
martinet.  What  would  she  say  to  this  exposure 
of  the  shop  secret?  Madame  was  triumphant, 
resplendent. 

"Isn't  he  a  king?  Isn't  he  an  artist?  "  she  cried. 
"MyArmand!" 

Armand  refused  to  drive  in  the  park  on  ensuing 
days.  He  swore  with  astonishingly  vivid  and 
descriptive  oaths  at  the  mention  of  one  Madame 
Sheecawgo,  from  whom  they  had  large  orders. 
His  whole  existence  was  centered  in  an  artistic 
enthusiasm  because  a  little  girl  with  a  retrousse 
nose  and  eyes  too  far  apart — but  what  eyes! — 
had  confessed  her  faults  and  asked  his  help. 

Voila!    Thursday  had  come  and  Lucy  had  tried 

113 


Lucy   of  the  Stars 

on  the  gowns  for  the  last  time.  Monsieur  himself 
had  been  present  on  each  occasion.  When  the  final 
touch  of  change  had  been  incorporated  by  the 
needles,  he  made  her  walk  up  and  down  while  he 
gazed  on  his  creation  raptly.  There  was  no  break 
in  her  enjoyment  of  the  play — you  see,  not  being 
beautiful  she  had  no  affectation — until  Monsieur 
remarked  that  when  her  knight  came  and  saw  her 
thus  he  would  be  won  at  a  glance.  Then  the  walls 
of  the  shop  seemed  so  close  that  the  girls  were 
within  a  foot  of  her  face  and  whirled  about  her. 

"For  my  dowry,"  she  said,  recovering,  "I  will 
refer  him  to  Monsieur  Celestin." 

"If  you  had  been  in  the  time  of  the  Revolution, 
Mademoiselle,"  he  said,  "you  would  have  needed 
no  dowry.  You  would  have  been  a  duchess,  and 
I,  Mademoiselle,  may  it  please  you,  would  have 
designed  the  Empress'  coronation  robes.  Ma- 
dame Beauharnais,  of  Martinique!  Zut-t-t! 
Why  did  all  the  world  wear  the  hideous  creation 
of  the  Empire?  Because  it  became  Josephine, 
who  set  the  fashion!" 

Lucy  promised  to  write  to  him  how  her  evening 
gown  was  received  at  its  "first  night"  in  America. 
She  was  pleased  to  make  him  happy;  she  was 
pleased  that  she  had  won  the  friendship  of  the 
girls  in  Celestin's.  It  is  good  to  do  that  when  you 
have  ghosts.     True,  simpering  casuist,  you  may 

114 


No  Circles  for  the  Shore 

say  that  she  had  a  selfish  interest;  but  those  who 
are  bad  in  heart  do  not,  as  a  rule,  choose  such  a 
method  of  keeping  ghosts  away. 

It  was  after  one,  now,  and  since  eleven  the  girls 
had  been  wondering,  with  sighs  of  dread  of  a  thing 
which  grows  worse  the  longer  it  is  delayed,  why 
Madame  Sheecawgo — for  so  they  pronounced  the 
name — had  not  come  at  the  hour  set.  There  were 
her  gowns  hung  on  the  holders  awaiting  her;  and 
when  she  did  come,  they  knew  that  in  the  name  of 
the  god  Mammon  they  must  be  polite  and  hold 
their  tongues. 

"It  is  all  in  the  way  of  custom,"  said  the  smart- 
est of  the  girls,  Marianne.  "If  the  hippopotamus 
came  with  a  pocketful  of  money  we  would  clothe 
her.  Heinf  the  hippopotamus  is  bigger  than  even 
Madame  Sheecawgo  and  could  carry  more  lace, 
not  to  mention  the  breadth  of  satin  skirt  required  I" 

Not  that  the  girls  altogether  disliked  Americans. 
Mrs.  Belmore,  for  example,  was  most  charming 
and  considerate — so  considerate,  Marianne  said, 
that  you  had  to  keep  reminding  yourself  of  her 
beauty — and  Miss  Hodges.  Ah,  Miss  Hodges! 
To  think  that  she  was  truly  the  daughter  of  Ma- 
dame Sheecawgo  !  Miss  Hodges,  so  beautiful  and 
quiet,  was  like  the  Venus  in  the  Louvre,  oh,  quite. 
Mrs.  Hodges  really  was  from  Kearn's  Ford  and 
Washington.     The  girls  had  heard  that  all  for- 

115 


Lucy  of  the  Stars 

tunes  in  Chicago  were  made  out  of  lard.  As  they 
were  sure  that  Mrs.  Hodges'  was  made  in  that  way 
they  had  named  her  Madame  Sheecawgo. 

"Madame  Sheecawgo  lives  in  a  continual  Mardi 
Gras.  She  throws  dollars  instead  of  confetti.  But 
dollars  will  not  buy  her  a  figure.  You  could  make 
that  only  with  a  carving-knife.  In  her  heart  she 
hates  that  Madame  Belmore.',  Thus  Marianne's 
intuition  had  discovered  a  thing  which  Mrs.  Bel- 
more  herself  had  never  suspected. 

The  luncheon  hour  was  long  past  and  still  Ma- 
dame Sheecawgo  had  not  come.  The  girls  were 
ravenously  hungry.  Madame  was  upstairs  at 
luncheon  with  Monsieur. 

"Probably  she  rose  late,"  Lucy  observed,  "and 
is  at  luncheon  herself.  I  would  go,  too,  if  I  were 
you."  So  they  hurried  out,  leaving  only  Cecile, 
a  new  girl,  on  watch. 

Lucy  herself  was  waiting  for  her  father,  who, 
at  eleven,  had  promised  to  be  back  in  half  an  hour. 
But  the  doctor  had  become  more  oblivious  to  the 
passage  of  time  than  if  he  were  working  out  a 
problem.  One  usually  is  when  buying  a  birthday 
present.  His  puzzle  was  not  how  much  he  could 
afford  to  spend,  but  how  much  he  dared  to  spend. 
That  pearl  necklace  which  he  had  seen  in  the  first 
shop  kept  calling  him  as  he  went  from  shop  to 
shop.     To  spend  the  great  sum  it  would  cost  for 

1*6 


No  Circles  for  the  Shore 

his  Lucy;  to  see  the  gleaming  string  about  her 
white  neck  when  she  never  imagined  its  value ! 

"Only  an  expert  can  tell  the  imitations  from  the 
real?"  he  asked  again  and  again. 

"Yes,  Monsieur;  try  for  yourself." 

He  tried  and  he  could  not.  Yet  his  eyes  were 
old  and  Lucy's  young  and  sharp.  Thus  it  was 
temptation  battling  with  fear  that  kept  him  loiter- 
ing on  the  Rue  de  la  Paix  in  a  state  of  nervous 
indecision. 

Two  o'clock  came  and  still  he  had  not  returned. 
It  was  then  that  a  coupe  drew  up  before  Madame 
Celestin's,  and  sidling  out  of  it  was  the  embonpoint 
of  a  lady  who  was  unmistakably  Madame  Shee- 
cawgo.  She  came  into  the  modiste's  with  the  air  of 
one  who  expected  her  gentility  to  be  disputed  on 
the  threshold  and  stood  ready  to  defend  it  at  any 
cost. 

"Everything  has  gone  wrong  this  morning.  My 
maid  did  not  wake  me.  When  I  did  get  up  I  drank 
too  much  coffee.  I  suppose  these  gowns  will  make 
me  look  a  fright.     Where  is  Madame?" 

"Upstairs,"  stammered  the  newest  and  youngest 
girl.     "I  will  call  her." 

"No.  I  like  that  Marianne  better.  She  is 
smart.    Where  is  she?" 

"At  lunch." 

"All  at  lunch !  The  shop  deserted !  Didn't  you 
117 


Lucy  of  the  Stars 

know  that  I  was  coming?  Didn't  I  have  an  ap- 
pointment?" (At  home  Mrs.  Hodges  explained 
her  liking  for  Europe  on  the  ground  that  one's 
inferiors  treated  one  with  much  more  respect 
there.) 

"I  am  very  sorry.  I — "  was  the  stammering 
response. 

Lucy  pitied  the  newest  and  youngest  girl.  She 
saw  an  opportunity  for  play  which  she  could  not 
resist.  Besides,  she  wanted  relief  from  the  ghosts 
which  were  already  making  harvest  of  her  father's 
dilatoriness. 

"Excellence,  pardon  me,"  said  she,  rising. 
Mrs.  Hodges'  face  softened  at  the  title,  just  as 
it  always  did  when  she  received  a  bill  in  the  Ger- 
man countries  beginning  "High-well-born  lady." 
aMay  it  please  you,  Excellence,  I  belong  in  the 
back  shop.  Usually  I  do  not  assist  at  trying  on. 
Allow  me  to  help  you  till  Madame  herself  comes." 

Now  she  began  playing  her  part — how  beauti- 
fully it  kept  the  ghosts  away! — with  the  same 
eagerness  and  acuteness  of  execution  and  shrewd- 
ness of  observation  which  she  had  shown  in  her 
interview  with  the  old  earl.  Were  she  ever  re- 
duced to  poverty  she  had  always  said  that  she 
would  turn  modiste  or  milliner  rather  than  give 
lessons  in  music. 

Madame  came  in  and  Lucy  winked  at  her. 
Mrs.  Hodges  added  a  compliment,   for  she  was 

118 


No  Circles  for  the  Shore 

delighted  with  Lucy,  who  had  praised  her  com- 
plexion and  hair.  Madame  never  interfered  with 
the  happiness  or  the  self-deceit  of  a  customer. 
The  girls  came  in  and  Lucy  also  winked  to  them. 
You  may  be  sure  that  they  were  not  going  to  spoil 
the  fun.  Monsieur  Celestin  at  his  peep-hole  was 
seeing  Mrs.  Hodges,  but  not  enough  of  Lucy. 
When  in  a  whisper  Lucy  sent  for  him  he  came. 
As  he  bent  to  arrange  the  train  Monsieur  looked 
up  at  the  breadth  and  thickness  with  the  same  sigh 
which  painters  had  drawn  when  Mrs.  Hodges 
posed  for  them. 

"Excellence,"  Lucy  translated  for  Monsieur, 
"Monsieur  Celestin  suggests  that  it  is  quite  im- 
possible to  make  artistic  use  of  such  a  large  piece 
of  lace  on  this  gown  without  cutting  it." 

"But  I  must  have  it  so.  Why,  I  have  never 
worn  it — once!  I  paid  ten  thousand  francs  for 
it.  It  must  not  be  cut.  I  got  it  for  one  of  Geral- 
dine's  heirlooms."  With  a  financier's  impatience 
of  deficits,  Mrs.  Hodges  had  determined  that 
her  daughter  should  lack  nothing  which  a  family 
requires. 

Monsieur  excused  himself  and  went  downstairs, 
where  he  swore  villainously  for  five  minutes. 
Later  he  came  up  to  watch  Lucy.  The  last  gown 
was  being  tried  on  when  Mr.  and  Mrs.  Belmore 
and  Miss  Hodges  and  John  Frane  appeared. 
Mrs.  Hodges  walked  out  into  the  reception-room 

119 


Lucy  of  the  Stars 

to  show  them  the  creation  with  which  she  was 
going  to  "flabbergast"  Washington  that  winter. 
Lucy,  half  kneeling,  glanced  up  to  see  a  tall  and 
distinguished-looking  girl  who  called  Madame 
Sheecawgo  "mother,"  a  couple  in  the  middle  thir- 
ties whom  she  liked  at  once,  and  behind  them  a 
face  much  too  lined  for  its  years,  but  lighted  up 
with  fighting,  boyish  blue  eyes. 

"It  makes  you  look  grand,  Excellence"  said 
Lucy,  finally. 

That  wicked  Marianne  started  the  smile  which 
ran  around  among  the  girls,  who  instantly  saw  the 
French  application  of  the  word.  Madame  would 
have  discharged  Marianne  long  ago  if  Monsieur 
would  have  permitted  it. 

"Grand  as  the  hippopotamus,"  said  Marianne 
in  an  aside. 

But  the  newcomers  understood  French,  if  Mrs. 
Hodges  did  not.  Miss  Hodges  was  crimson. 
This  time  the  girls  sniggered  aloud.  Mrs.  Hodges 
herself  began  to  comprehend  that  she  was  an  ob- 
ject of  ridicule.  Madame  Celestin's  scowl  of  rage 
toward  Marianne,  if  nothing  else,  would  have  told 
her  so.  Lucy  realised  the  situation ;  her  quick  con- 
science told  her  that  she  was  partly  responsible  for 
wounding  another's  feelings.  She  held  up  a  finger 
with  a  drop  of  blood  on  the  end. 

"Marianne  asks  me  if  I  am  trying  to  sew  my 
120 


No  Circles  for  the  Shore 

finger  onto  the  gown,"  she  said  to  Mrs.  Hodges. 
"It  does  not  take  much  to  make  a  joke  in  France," 
she  continued  in  English,  and  that  was  meant  as  a 
cut  for  Marianne's  impertinence.  "You  see,  it  is 
not  like  America." 

Mrs.  Hodges  burst  out  laughing  and  Miss 
Hodges  bit  her  lip.  Only  John  Frane  had  ob- 
served that  Lucy's  prick  was  self-inflicted. 

"Do  you  know,"  said  Mrs.  Hodges  to  Lucy, 
"I'm  very  much  taken  with  you,  little  one.  You 
speak  English  so  prettily.  It's  wonderful  how 
few  French  people  do.  How  would  you  like  to 
come  and  live  with  me  in  America  as  a  sort  of — 
of  superior  maid?" 

"Excellence,  you  are  too  kind,"  said  Lucy.  "I 
— I  would  have  to  ask  my  father." 

The  girls  scattered  with  their  handkerchiefs  to 
their  mouths  and  the  awkward  pause  was  broken 
by  the  entry  of  Dr.  von  Kar,  who  was  carrying  a 
jeweller's  box,  which  he  thrust  into  his  pocket  at 
sight  of  Belmore. 

"My  daughter,"  said  the  doctor,  presenting 
Lucy. 

"Good  Lord!"  said  Mrs.  Hodges,  who  had  oc- 
casional lapses  back  to  her  normal,  her  good  self 
when  taken  by  surprise.  It  was  a  round,  flat 
"Good  Lord."  "Ain't  that  a  strange  thing  for  a 
lady  to  do!" 

121 


Lucy  of  the  Stars 

"Maude  Adams  or  Ethel  Barrymore  could  not 
have  done  it  better,"  said  John  Frane,  all  aglow 
with  admiration. 

uOh!"  said  Lucy;  and  she  thought,  "of  course 
— actresses."  Then  she  asked  Mrs.  Hodges' 
pardon  for  the  trick  she  had  played.  But  Mrs. 
Hodges  was  never  to  forget  Excellence.  She  saw 
in  that  a  satire  which  its  author  never  intended. 
As  Lucy  and  her  father  excused  themselves  she 
overheard  Mrs.  Belmore — who  thought  that  the 
information  would  delight  Mrs.  Hodges — say  to 
that  lady  before  she  returned  to  the  dressing-room : 

"Lin  has  just  had  a  note  from  the  young  Earl 
of  Carniston  saying  that  he  is  taking  a  trip  after 
the  shock  of  his  father's  death  and  he  is  going  to 
New  York  on  the  Oceanic  with  us" — and  Mrs. 
Hodges  began  at  once  to  think  of  herself  as  the 
mother  of  a  countess. 

Lucy  wondered  if  she  revealed  her  emotion  to 
her  father  on  hearing  this  news.  She  thought  of 
finding  an  excuse  for  transferring  their  passage  to 
another  steamer.  But  if  she  was  so  afraid  of  being 
near  Carniston,  what  hope  had  she  of  ever  killing 
those  ghosts  altogether?  She  was  weak,  but  not 
quite  so  weak  as  that.  If  you  are  on  thin  ice,  some- 
times it  is  better  to  skate  swiftly  and  straight 
ahead,  and  sometimes  it  is  not.  Lucy  had  declared 
against  any  circles  for  the  shore. 

122 


XI 

ON  A   NEW  FOOTING 

WITH  nothing  to  do  before  the  departure 
of  the  train  to  Calais,  with  the  whole 
afternoon  of  a  fine  day  before  them,  the  doctor, 
his  face  like  the  September  sunlight  itself,  waited 
on  a  propitious  moment  at  the  luncheon-table  for 
the  disclosure  of  his  purchase  to  Lucy. 

"They're  imitation,  dear,  I  confess,"  he  said, 
ubut  it  pleased  me  to  buy  them  for  you  as  a  birth- 
day gift  in  that  very  Rue  de  la  Paix  where  I  once 
fought  behind  barricades  and  in  this  very  Paris 
where  you  were  born ;  and  it  will  complete  my  hap- 
piness if  when  you  wear  your  wonderful  gown  you 
will  wear  these  also." 

Lucy  blushed  with  pleasure,  and  she  blushed, 
too,  because  his  suggestion  went  against  her  nature. 

"I  almost  fear  they  will  burn  little  holes  in  my 
neck,"  she  said  at  length.  "They  wouldn't  if  I 
had  their  duplicates  in  a  safe-deposit  box.  A  real 
duchess,  I  believe,  need  never  take  the  originals 
out,  but  a  countess  must  occasionally  if  she  would 

123 


Lucy  of  the  Stars 

keep  the  faith.     What  a  remarkable  thing  the  hu- 
man conscience  is." 

"No  one  but  ourselves  will  know  that  they  are 
not  real,  and  your  charm,  dear,  will  make  them 
real  to  me/'  he  persisted;  "and  my  pleasure  at  see- 
ing you  wear  them,  I  hope,  will  make  them  real  to 
you.  Please — you  see  this  is  my  Paris;  I  have 
a  touch  of  my  old  Parisian  madness  as  I  call  it — 
please  humour  me  I" 

"What  a  courtier  you  must  have  been  in  your 
time!"  she  exclaimed,  and  knew  instantly  she  had 
spoken  that  she  had  struck  a  false  note  by  that 
contraction  of  the  muscles  of  his  face  which  was 
the  signal  of  a  tide  of  recollection  of  the  days  when 
he  had  been  a  gallant  indeed,  and  a  devil  as  well,  in 
this  same  Paris.  ' 

She  smiled  brightly  to  dissipate  his  cloud  and, 
surrendering  herself  to  the  deception,  clasped  the 
pearls  around  her  neck  that  he  might  see  the  effect. 

We  have  already  said  that  the  doctor  was  happy 
and  that  he  beamed;  and  in  lieu  of  other  adjec- 
tives as  fitting  we  will  only  add  that  he  beamed 
more  than  ever  and  was  happier  than  ever,  while 
he  digressed  from  his  rule  of  silence  into  reminis- 
cences of  the  days  when  he  dined  on  a  crust  and 
was  heroic.  Not  that  he  told  anything  of  his  life- 
story  where  it  concerned  Lucy,  for  his  narrative 
was  impersonal. 

124 


On  a  New  Footing 

"There  is  no like  an  old !"    No,  we 

will  hardly  say  that  of  the  doctor  yet,  when  he  has 
been  out  of  school  such  a  short  time  in  the  delight- 
ful havoc  of  having  Lucy  and  her  talents  all  to 
himself.  He  had  his  bad  moments,  but  I  fear  we 
may  not  credit  them  to  conscience,  for  they  were 
entirely  concerned  with  the  business  of  making  a 
falsehood  of  a  size  and  nature  which  would  be 
credible. 

When  he  and  Lucy  went  aboard  the  Oceanic  at 
Liverpool  and  the  steward,  with  that  due  appre- 
ciation of  the  power  of  wealth  never  wanting  on 
Atlantic  liners,  showed  them  to  what  the  company's 
folders  called  a  "palatial  suite,"  Lucy's  surprise 
was  so  manifest  that  the  doctor  felt  he  must  tell 
the  biggest  one  yet. 

"You  see,  my  dear,"  he  explained,  "it  is  quite 
surprising  the  number  of  friends  one  makes;  and 
when  one  announces  that  he  is  going  on  a  vacation 
they  come  forward  in  their  real,  thoroughbred 
English  way,  which  never  mistakes  politeness  for 
favours,  and  do  something  tangible  for  him,  as 
the  manager  of  this  line  has  done.  Sir  Henry 
Eversham  insisted  that  I  should  accept  these 
rooms.     Could  I  do  otherwise?" 

"I  certainly  shouldn't  want  you  to  be  rude  to 
your  friends,"  said  Lucy,  who  was  not  altogether 
indifferent  to  personal  comfort.      As  her  glance 

125 


Lucy  of  the  Stars 

swept  her  own  room,  with  its  luxurious  appoint- 
ments, she  added,  "I'll  write  a  letter  to  Sir  Henry 
myself  telling  him  how  lovely  it  all  is." 

That  franc-tireur — who  had  saved  his  life  by 
the  promptness  and  ease  of  his  German  in  express- 
ing his  delight  at  escaping  in  disguise  from  the 
French — was  too  old  a  hand  ever  to  lose  counte- 
nance. He  foresaw  that  he  should  have  to  take 
charge  of  posting  Lucy's  letters  when  they 
landed. 

"That  will  be  very  charming  of  you,"  he  said. 
"Now  let  us  go  on  deck  to  see  the  late  ones  come 
aboard." 

Among  the  last  was  Carniston,  who  was  with 
the  Belmores.  Travelling  direct  from  Burbridge 
and  not  by  the  regular  train,  he  had  met  them  on 
the  pier  among  the  litter  of  baggage  only  five  min- 
utes before,  and  he  had  heard  nothing  of  Lucy's 
crossing  by  the  same  steamer. 

Whenever  his  passion  had  come  surging  back 
he  had  sternly  told  himself  that  this  chapter  of  his 
life  was  finished.  It  would  be  as  unwise  to  wish 
ever  to  see  her  again  as  to  wish  a  wound  reopened. 
Her  cold  attitude  at  their  parting,  though  at  the 
time  seeming  cruel,  had  latterly  been  a  source  of 
gratification  to  him.  If  he  had  killed  her  love, 
as  he  thought,  he  was  relieved  of  remorse,  and  his 
alone  was  the  pain.     It  was  burning  the  bridges, 

126 


On  a  New   Footing 

too,  between  him  and  his  duty.  He  felt  that  he 
could  not  go  back  to  her  now,  for  she  would  not 
have  him.  From  that  of  a  light-hearted  youth  his 
mind  had  been  transformed  into  that  of  a  middle- 
aged  man  who  was  subjecting  his  personality  to 
the  one  idea  of  the  rescue  of  his  estate. 

Yet,  outwardly,  as  he  walked  to  the  gangway 
behind  the  others  chatting  to  Geraldine  Hodges, 
he  was  the  same  Carniston  that  his  friends  had 
always  known,  if  you  except  the  subdued  manner 
and  somewhat  drawn  face  which  were  inevitable 
considering  the  ordeal  of  bereavement  through 
which  he  had  just  passed.  John  Frane's  quick  eye 
ranging  the  deck  saw  Lucy,  and  he  called  Mrs.  Bel- 
more's  attention  to  her  as  he  lifted  his  hat.  Mrs. 
Hodges  was  altogether  engrossed  in  her  footing 
on  the  gangway  cleats,  and  her  arduous  progress 
delayed  the  advance  of  the  others.  When  Carnis- 
ton looked  up  and  saw  pressed  against  one  of  the 
uprights,  smiling  in  the  flesh,  that  face  which 
had  haunted  him  for  weeks,  he  was  wholly  dum- 
founded. 

Her  greeting  was  that  of  the  good  fellowship  of 
man  and  girl  who  have  been  chums.  She  waved 
her  muff  and  called  out  a  vibrant  "How  do  you 
do!"  while  he  saw  her  pointing  him  out  to  her 
father.  He  thought  that  she  was  poking  fun  at 
him  for  being  with  Miss  Hodges;  he  could  hear 

127 


Lucy  of  the  Stars 


and  see  her  as  she  would  mock  his  suit  for  Geral- 
dine's  wealth. 

It  was  plainly  his  duty  to  go  to  the  upper  deck 
at  once  and  greet  Dr.  von  Kar,  whom  he  was  con- 
scious of  having  neglected  even  before  his  father's 
death.  But  he  went  to  his  cabin,  where  he  tried  to 
adjust  his  mind  to  this  new  situation  of  being  on  the 
sea  for  seven  days  with  Lucy.  Why  had  she  chosen 
the  Oceanic  when  she  might  as  well  have  gone  by 
some  other  steamer?  But  questions  were  futile. 
She  was  aboard!  He  must  put  his  resolutions  to 
the  test  of  temptation.  He  could  not  hide  in  his 
cabin  throughout  the  voyage. 

In  the  meantime,  Lucy  had  left  .her  father's  side 
in  the  hope  of  speaking  to  Carniston  before  the 
doctor  should  see  him.  The  two  met  on  deck  with 
no  one  they  knew  in  sight.  While  he  was  undecided 
and  embarrassed  as  to  what  to  say  or  do,  she  held 
out  her  hand  blithely  and  he  took  it  solemnly  and 
awkwardly. 

"Of  course,"  she  said,  with  a  smile  that  tem- 
pered the  impulse  of  her  remark,  "there  was  no 
reason  why  I  shouldn't  go  to  America  after  a  rich 
husband  at  the  same  time  that  you  went  after  a 
rich  wife.     Shall  we  promenade  for  a  moment?" 

The  very  quality  of  the  unexpected  in  her  char- 
acter renewed  in  that  instant  all  its  attraction  for 
him.    He  who  had  sworn  a  score  of  times  that  he 

128 


On  a  New   Footing 

never  wanted  to  see  her  again,  experienced  his  old 
pleasure  in  being  near  her,  in  hearing  her  voice,  in 
watching  the  vivacity  of  her  expression.  He  short- 
ened his  step  and  she  lengthened  hers,  as  they 
had  so  often  done  in  intimate  strolls. 

"Arthur — I  am  never  going  to  call  you  Carnis- 
ton,"  she  began.  Arthur — that  name  which  he  had 
not  heard  since  she  used  it  last.  It  marked  the 
point  where  joy  ended  and  misery  began. 

"Yes,  do  call  me  Arthur,  Lucy,"  he  could  not 
help  saying.  "I — I  like  to  hear  a  little  music 
occasionally." 

"Then,  later  on  I  will  sing  you  a  never-care  song 
to  pay  for  the  favour  I  am  about  to  ask.  You 
know  that  father  knows  nothing  of  our — of  what 
has  passed  between  us.  I  want  him  never  to  know. 
You  have  a  duty  to  Burbridge;  I  have  a  duty  to 
him.  He  had  observed  that  of  late  you  had  been 
coming  to  the  house  often  and  that  you  were  always 
seeing  me  instead  of  him,  as  in  the  old  days.  I 
told  him  that  you  saw  me  because  you  happened 
to  call  when  he  was  not  at  home  and  because 
you  said  that  we  had  the  best  tea  in  London. 
Now,  won't  you  make  a  point  for  me,  please,  of 
being  just  the  same  to  him,  one  of  his  proteges  in 
science,  as  you  have  always  been,  and  not  let — and 
not  let  our  little  flirtation,  Arthur " 

"Don't  say  flirtation!"  he  exclaimed,  almost 
129 


Lucy  of  the  Stars 

angrily.  "It  wasn't  that.  It's  shameful  to  call 
it  that!" 

"Our  romantic  betrothal,  then,  which  was  forced 
into  liquidation  for  want  of  capital  to  float  the 
undertaking." 

"Yes,  yes.  I'll  not  interrupt  again,"  he  remon- 
strated. "You  have  too  many  arrows  in  your 
quiver." 

"Please  not  let  that  in  any  way  change  your  rela- 
tions with  him.  Please  tell  him  that  I  was  sure  he 
was  not  at  home  the  other  day  when  you  called  to 
say  good-bye.  Your  neglect  hurt  him  a  little.  He 
is  very  fond  of  you.  And  ask  him  if  he  has  any 
more  of  that  special  brand  of  tea  aboard.  He  has, 
but  ask  him  just  the  same.  It  will  please  him.  If 
you  will  be  nice  about  this,  Arthur,  I'll  do  any- 
thing I  can  to  help  you  with  Miss  Hodges.  It  is 
to  be  Miss  Hodges,  isn't  it?  I  hear  she  is  im- 
mensely rich." 

"Lucy,  you  are — you  aren't  kind,"  he  com- 
plained. 

"Kind?  Why  not?  You  have  an  ambition  and 
I  want  to  help  you.  Isn't  that  kind?  We  will 
have  tea  every  afternoon  in  our  cabin,  and  you 
must  bring  Miss  Hodges  when  it  is  not  rough." 

"I — I  think  I  would  better  not,"  he  said,  in  the 
sternness  of  self-command. 

"But  she  doesn't  know.  I  am  just  an  acquaint- 
130 


On  a  New  Footing 

ance — an  acquaintance  who  serves  good  tea.  Of 
course  if  you  wish  to  refuse,  Arthur,  I  beg  your 
pardon.  I — "  She  spoke  as  if  he  had  injured 
her  feelings. 

"I  shan't  miss  a  day,"  he  said,  "and  I'll  bring 
Miss  Hodges  by  order.  Now  I'll  find  your  father, 
and  try  to  say  exactly  what  you  have  told  me  to 
say."   ' 

Why  did  she  come  on  the  Oceanic  when  she 
knew  that  it  was  my  steamer?  he  asked  himself 
again.  Why  did  I  talk  to  him  in  that  way  and 
not  confine  myself  to  what  I  had  started  to  say? 
she  asked  herself.  It  was  a  relief  to  him  to  leave 
her,  to  be  away  from  the  glance  of  her  eyes  and 
from  the  rhythm  of  her  step  with  his. 


I3i 


XII 

IT  BECOMES  A  TALE  OF  FOUR 

SNUG  in  her  rugs  in  mid-Atlantic  Lucy  von 
Kar  laid  down  the  book  which  she  had  been 
reading  and  let  her  fancy  play  with  the  shots  of 
spray  and  the  swirls  of  foam  when  the  waves  broke. 
The  Oceanic,  stretching  her  bulk  the  breadth  of  its 
trough,  little  minded  the  heavy  sea  that  was  run- 
ning. A  floating  hotel  she  was,  doing  her  eight- 
een knots  steadily,  laying  her  own  track  as  she 
went,  following  it  as  straight  as  a  limited  train 
the  rails,  and  equally  sure  of  arriving  at  her  des- 
tination on  time  with  the  pilgrims  who  had  been  to 
the  old  land  and  were  returning  to  the  new  land. 
As  she  looked  down  the  long  line  of  chairs  at 
the  varying  faces  she  felt  that  she  was  already  in 
America.  College  students  who  had  had  a  taste 
of  Europe  before  settling  down  to  work,  sight-seers 
who  had  at  last  enjoyed  the  tour  of  their  fireside 
imaginings,  transatlantic  drummers,  country  school 
teachers  whose  savings  for  years  had  bought  a 
membership  in  a  Cook  party,  the  millionaire  and 
his  clerk — all  had  the  manner,  the  countenance, 

132 


It  Becomes  a  Tale  of  Four 

the  speech  which  the  world  calls  American.  Even 
the  man  with  an  income,  living  partly  abroad  and 
partly  at  home,  hybridised  and  uncertain  of  him- 
self, still  bore  the  marks  which  the  conditions  and 
the  climate  of  a  new  land  set  upon  the  immigrant's 
children. 

None  of  the  passengers  to  Lucy's  mind  was 
more  distinctly  un-European  than  John  Frane,  who 
was  at  that  moment  pacing  the  deck  with  the  vig- 
our of  one  in  a  race  for  time.  She  was  always 
expecting  that  the  next  time  he  approached  her  he 
might  address  her  by  her  first  name,  and  was  won- 
dering if  she  should  resent  it  or  if  she  could,  con- 
sidering his  manner. 

"Splendid,  isn't  it!"  he  cried,  stopping  before 
her  with  a  nod  of  his  head  out  to  sea,  which  made 
the  lady  next  to  Lucy  close  her  eyes  in  a  sensation 
of  disgust  deeper  than  the  region  of  her  heart. 

"Yes,  I  like  the  feel  of  it  in  my  nostrils,  don't 
you  ?"  she  said.  "I  am  always  thinking  that  no  one 
ever  breathed  that  breathful  before." 

"There  you  have  the  English  of  it !  You  always 
want  to  be  in  your  own  hansom  on  your  own 
island,  or  on  your  own  steamer  in  your  own  sea." 

"Isn't  that  better  than  being  in  somebody's  else? 
In  America,  I  believe,  your  hansoms  are  provided 
with  travelling  companions.  I  was  surprised  to  find 
first  and  second  class  on  this  steamer." 

133 


Lucy  of  the  Stars 

''Because  some  people  have  money  to  afford 
better  passages  than  others,"  John  remarked. 

"That  destroys  any  idea  of  caste,  of  course/' 
she  said. 

"At  all  events" — and  this  was  like  the  man — 
"I  wish  all  the  tired  people  in  America  could 
have  a  taste  of  this  salt  air;  and  you'll  get  more 
of  it  yourself  if  you  feel  like  walking." 

He  unwound  the  mummy  of  her  rugs,  as  she  put 
it,  and  as  soon  as  she  was  galvanised  into  life  again 
she  tried  to  keep  step  with  his  strides  as  they 
ranged  the  deck. 

"This  is  America  already;  what  do  you  think 
of  it?"  he  asked,  as  he  nodded  toward  the  people 
on  the  deck. 

"They  seem  dry  and  sharp-looking,"  she  said, 
"very  different  from  the  ruddy  Germans  and  Eng- 
lish from  whom  they  are  descended.  They  are 
like  pen-and-ink  sketches.  The  women  seem  superb 
and  leisurely.  The  men  are  over-earnest  drudges 
who,  panther-like,  concentrate  all  of  their  facul- 
ties on  their  work.  I  like  their  candour.  Five  or 
six  have  already  told  me  how  they  made  their 
fortunes." 

"Yes,  when  they  have  made  their  money  they  put 
in  their  vacations  telling  how  they  made  it.  One 
listens  to  another's  story  in  the  smoking-room  in 
order  that  he  may  have  somebody  to  listen  to  his. 

134 


It  Becomes  a  Tale  of  Four 

Each  dresses  up  his  women  and  worships  them.  It 
is  this  type  which  has  made  our  country  what  it 
is,  in  one  sense,  and  in  another  sense  has  squeezed 
it  as  if  it  were  a  lemon.  Every  one  has  been  so 
preoccupied  with  his  own  fortune  that  he  hasn't 
had  time  to  see  what  was  going  on  around  him  or 
to  take  an  interest  in  the  affairs  of  the  whole  coun- 
try. But  they  are  mine — my  people — and  I  love 
them  because  I  know  them." 

"I  only  hope  that  all  Americans  are  as  nice  as 
the  Belmores,"  said  Lucy  softly. 

uLin  is  my  best  and  oldest  friend,"  said  John. 
"As  for  Fanny,  you  seem  to  find  her  what  we  at 
home  all  find  her." 

"Simple,  unaffected  and  genuine,"  Lucy  re- 
sponded. 

"To  be  genuine — that  is  the  cardinal  point," 
Frane  plunged  on,  in  the  superabundance  of  his 
energy,  which  found  insufficient  outlets  aboard  ship. 
"Is  that  fitting  genuine  brass?  Is  the  man  genuine, 
be  he  stoker  or  captain  ?  Is  the  pearl  necklace  on 
my  lady's  neck  genuine?" 

"It  would  be  pardonable,"  said  Lucy,  "don't 
you  think,  if  she  had  a  real  string  in  the  safe-de- 
posit vault  ?  I  do  think  we  are  sailing  on  a  genuine 
sea,  judging  from  yesterday's  storm,  and  I  am  sure 
that  most  of  the  sea-sickness  I  have  seen  is  genuine." 

"You  are  certainly  excellent  company,"  said 
135 


Lucy  of  the  Stars 

Frane.  "You  can  take  the  opposite  side  for  the 
sake  of  argument,  and  that  is  the  life  of  talk. 
People  may  say  that  you  are  inconsistent.  They 
say  that  I  am  because  I  agree  with  both  the  Metho- 
dist presiding  elder  and  the  Catholic  priest  that  are 
aboard,  but  I  am  not.  I  agree  with  them  only  so 
far  and  get  a  grip  of  them  with  that  little.  They 
are  both  doing  good  work  and  they  are  both  gen- 
uine. I  go  mining  for  the  good  that  is  in  them. 
If  you  don't  do  that  sort  of  thing  you  are  a  pes- 
simist who  sits  twiddling  his  thumbs  and  intoning 
calamity.  The  whole  art  is  in  keeping  the  good 
that  is  in  men  busy  and  the  bad  idle." 

Frane  and  Belmore  had  been  at  school  and  col- 
lege together.  In  manhood,  as  in  boyhood,  they 
had  taken  each  other  for  granted.  At  football 
Lindley  played  steadily  and  evenly  and  John 
played  brilliantly.  If  Lindley  made  a  fumble  it 
was  never  forgotten;  if  John  made  a  fumble 
everybody  forgave  and  sympathised  with  him. 
When  Belmore  made  a  star  play  people  said, 
"Good  for  Belmore!"  in  a  matter-of-fact  way. 
When  Frane  made  a  star  play  it  was  the  wonder 
of  the  world  because  it  was  Frane's. 

It  was  in  the  fifth  year,  while  they  were  in  the 
law  school,  that  a  combat  of  famous  memory  oc- 
curred between  these  friends.    Although  not  yet  a 

136 


It  Becomes  a  Tale  of  Four 

custom  in  their  club,  Lindley,  as  a  rule,  dressed  for 
dinner,  not  from  affectation,  but  because  he  was 
Lindley  and  that  was  his  way.  One  night  when 
he  had  been  meeting  a  tirade  from  his  friend 
with  cool  and  characteristic  satire,  John  said, 
explosively : 

"Lin,  that  shirt  front  of  yours  is  too  immacu- 
late. It  is  a  whited  sepulchre  of  respectability. 
I  have  about  come  to  the  conclusion  that  a  man 
who  dresses  for  dinner  every  night  among  a  lot 
of  students  is  a  snob,  and  I  am  going  to  throw 
this  bowl  of  salad  at  you.,, 

The  tomatoes  landed  on  the  shirt  front  with 
unerring  impact. 

"And  by  way  of  refutation,  John,  I  am  going  to 
thrash  you,"  said  Lindley,  rising  as  coolly  as  if  to  a 
point  of  order. 

"You'll  have  to  catch  me  first — you're  covered 
with  tomatoes,  untidy  thing,"  said  John,  bolting. 

But  he  waited  for  Lindley  outside  in  the  yard 
and  they  set  to,  while  the  others  who  had  left  the 
table  gave  them  room.  Frane  was  as  brilliant  and 
ferocious  in  his  attacks,  Belmore  as  steady,  as  usual. 
Although  his  tactics  were  against  him  in  a  long 
struggle,  every  spectator  thought  that  John  would 
win  because  they  believed  in  him.  For  the  same 
human  reason  the  people  had  learned  later  to  be- 
lieve in  him  and  vote  for  him  and  forgive  his  faults. 

137 


Lucy  of  the  Stars 

The  bout  was  stopped  by  the  passing  of  a  pro- 
fessor, who  remarked  that  an  exhibition  of  such 
bad  blood  between  young  men  of  their  years  was 
most  immoral,  and  such  a  scrimmage — here  he  was 
very  emphatic — in  plain  view  of  the  village  people 
was  most  unbecoming. 

"Oh,  we  adore  each  other,"  said  John,  laughing, 
as  he  rose. 

"Yes,  I  assure  you,  sir,  it  is  only  a  difference 
between  friends,"  added  Belmore,  whose  torn 
clothes  were  slippery  with  oil,  tomatoes  and 
vinegar. 

"I  mean  I  adore  him,"  John  corrected.  "Plato 
is  never  quite  that  vulgar.  At  all  events,  Lin,  I 
don't  think  you  are  really  a  snob,  though  it  was  a 
little  mean  of  you  to  pig  all  the  salad  just  because 
I  offered  it  to  you.  Besides,  to  finish  your  dinner 
in  negligee  will  be  a  lesson  to  you." 

When  John  returned  from  his  studies  in  Europe, 
Lindley,  despite  all  the  pressure  of  responsibility 
which  had  fallen  to  him  with  his  father's  death, 
travelled  five  hundred  miles  in  order  to  meet  his 
friend  at  the  pier.  John,  when  he  took  up  his 
life-work,  had  known  precisely  what  he  wanted 
to  do,  and  Lindley  had  known  precisely  what 
he  must  do.  The  energy  of  the  one  was  to  be 
devoted  to  his  country  and  that  of  the  other  to 
the  conservation  of  one  of  those  great  fortunes 

138 


It  Becomes  a  Tale  of  Four 

which,  according  to  John's  dogma,  represented 
one  of  the  foremost  national  dangers.  Each  was 
submerging  self  in  an  idea,  and  possibly  this  was 
the  basis  of  sympathy  that  kept  their  friendship 
warm. 

John  had  set  up  a  law  office  in  Kearn's  Ford, 
where  he  began  practising  politics  at  once  with 
the  same  intensity  of  effort  as  a  young  Irish 
boy  in  New  York.  He  was  now  in  his  third 
term  as  a  member  of  the  House  of  Representa- 
tives. 

To  Lucy,  with  her  European  ideas,  he  was  a 
puzzle.  She  had  met  workers  in  the  slums,  leaders 
of  all  kinds  of  movements  for  uplifting  the  body 
politic,  and  that  young  English  public  man  who 
figures  in  English  novels  as  a  hero  and  whose  ad- 
miring friends  point  him  out  as  a  future  prime 
minister,  but  whose  career  is  ruined  by  an  inciden- 
tal love  story  and  too  much  ennui.  He  was  cer- 
tainly not  of  any  of  these  types.  She  found  his 
talk  on  every  conceivable  subject — and  he  seemed 
to  have  ideas  on  all — of  service  in  keeping  the 
ghosts  away.  His  activity  was  so  incessant  that 
it  seemed  almost  as  if  he  must  have  ghosts  of  his 
own. 

In  the  few  turns  on  deck  which  they  had  had 
together  Carniston  had  listened  intently  to  Frane ; 
but,  generally  speaking,  he  had  avoided  Frane  and 

139 


Lucy  of  the  Stars 

Frane  had  found  him  unproductive.  It  was  mar- 
vellous and  disconcerting  to  Carniston,  this  exam- 
ple of  a  young  man  engaged  heart  and  soul  in  a 
fight  that  he  loved  without  the  call  of  the  dead  to 
hold  him  down  to  a  sense  of  duty  which  society 
had  established  for  him.  The  truth  was,  he  en- 
vied the  American  that  freedom  which  had  the 
smart  and  the  joy  of  salt  spray. 

"You  knew  the  earl  man" — this  was  Frane's 
title  for  Carniston — "before  he  came  aboard  ?"  he 
asked  Lucy. 

Lucy  nodded. 

"He  said  that  he  was  not  coming  to  America 
to  shoot,"  Frane  continued,  "so  I  suppose  that  he 
has  come  hunting — it  is  always  one  or  the  other 
when  they  travel  in  America — hunting  a  rich  wife, 
I  mean.  If  you  go  to  Washington  you  will  meet 
the  wife-hunters1  brigade  in  action.  It  is  really  a 
kind  of  trade  union,  I  believe,  with  unwritten  rules 
about  poaching  on  one  another's  preserves.  They 
will  not  welcome  such  a  handsome  young  English 
lord.  He  will  rob  some  Continental  count  of  the 
big  game  he  has  carefully  stalked." 

"Miss  Hodges  is  very  rich,  isn't  she?"  Lucy 
asked. 

"Yes.  She  and  her  mother  have  about  five 
millions,  I  think.    It  is  bound  up  with  the  Belmore 

140 


It  Becomes  a  Tale  of  Four 

fortune."  Frane  did  not  miss  the  lack  of  connec- 
tion between  Lucy's  query  and  the  preceding 
remark. 

"Possibly,"  Lucy  proceeded,  "the  earl  will  go 
outside  the  market  you  mention.  He  is  quite  atten- 
tive to  Miss  Hodges." 

"What!  Geraldine?  Nonsense.  Geraldine  is 
only  twenty-two.  Why,"  and  he  looked  back 
over  his  shoulder  to  where  the  earl  was  stand- 
ing by  Geraldine's  chair — for  the  day  was  so  fair 
that  even  Mrs.  Hodges  had  made  such  progress 
that  she  was  saying  yes  she  would  and  no  she 
wouldn't  get  up,  to  the  distraction  of  her  maid, 
who  was  kept  going  up  and  down  stairs  to  report 
on  the  state  of  the  weather — "why,  I  have  watched 
Geraldine  grow  to  womanhood.  She  and  I  have 
been  pals  since  she  was  about -three.  We  call  each 
other  chums.  I  remember  when  I  made  a  run 
around  the  ends  and  got  right  across  the  line  with 
the  ball — the  last  time  I  ever  played — how  I 
lifted  her  up  on  my  shoulder  after  the  game  and 
everybody  cheered  like  mad.  She  is  just  develop- 
ing arid  looking  out  on  the  world  and  enjoying  her 
privileges  as  a  grown-up  girl.  She  won't  think  of 
marrying  for  three  or  four  years  yet." 

But  the  idea  that  Lucy  had  put  into  his  mind 
seemed  to  dry  up  Frane's  well  of  conversation,  and 
directly  he  excused  himself.    When  Carniston  left 

141 


Lucy  of  the  Stars 


Geraldine's  side  it  was  John  who  sat  down  beside 
her. 

"Have  you  been  delivering  many  speeches  to  the 
little  German  girl,  chums?"  she  asked  lightly. 

"You  think  I'm  a  sort  of  gramophone,  don't 
you,  Geraldine?  Honestly,  I'm  not  always  speech- 
making."  It  was  unusual  for  him  to  speak  to  her 
in  this  way,  half  petulantly,  half  pleadingly. 

"I  think  you  are  good  old  John  Frane  and  the 
best  fellow  in  the  world,"  she  said. 

It  was  not  quite  the  answer  he  expected  or 
wanted.  Good  old  John  Frane!  He  had  heard 
college  friends  shout  that  as  they  rushed  across  the 
street  to  grasp  his  hand.  Good  old  John  Frane! 
Something  put  the  stress  on  the  second  adjective 
for  the  first  time.  He  knew  that  his  hair  was  al- 
ready streaked  with  gray.  When  he  went  to  his 
cabin  he  looked  at  his  face  in  the  mirror,  and,  yes, 
he  had  to  admit  that  he  was  getting — old. 

"I  believe  you  are  gloomy,"  Geraldine  went  on. 
"I  believe  you  haven't  found  anybody  to  disagree 
with  you  to-day." 

But  this  was  rallying  him  in  a  way  that  he  did 
not  like  from  her  at  that  moment,  while  she  told 
herself  again  how  fond  she  was  of  him. 

Ever  clear  in  her  mind  were  the  events  of  that 
day  when,  a  girl  of  ten,  she  had  rowed  out  alone 
on  one  of  the  northern  lakes  and  her  boat  had  been 

142 


It  Becomes  a  Tale  of  Four 

capsized  in  a  blow.  Coolly  she  had  trod  water 
while  John  swam  to  her.  Infected  by  his  assur- 
ance that  it  was  "all  right,"  she  had  held  fast 
to  the  oar  on  which  she  rested  her  chin,  while  he 
towed  her  to  the  shore.  He  had  forgotten  his  part 
in  the  rescue.  He  remembered  only  how  she  had 
said  when  he  reached  her,  "Please  don't  scold, 
chums !" 


143 


XIII 

IF  THE  PEARLS  WERE  REAL 

OH,  those  never-care  songs!  So  little  in  the 
words  and  music  and  so  much  in  the  way- 
Lucy  sang  them — her  voice  a  mezzo  whose  limita- 
tions she  understood  well  enough  never  to  give 
offence  to  the  trained  ear — did  their  charm  lie  that 
it  defeats  an  author's  object  to  reduce  them  to  ink 
and  paper.  Some  had  the  joyousness  of  sunlight 
finding  its  way  through  the  clouds  and  others  the 
sadness  of  the  drum  of  rain  on  a  roof,  and  all  tem- 
pered with  the  philosophy  of  that  refrain  which 
she  shaded  with  a  hundred  meanings. 

On  the  afternoon  of  the  fourth  day  out  the 
group  whose  fortunes  concern  us  as  far  as  they 
concern  Lucy  and  John  Frane  and,  yes,  Geraldine 
and  the  earl,  too,  had  tea  with  the  von  Kars.  A 
piano  had  been  placed  in  the  suite  through  the 
kindness  of  the  ever-useful  Sir  Henry  Eversham, 
and  when  John  asked  if  it  was  real  or  for  orna- 
ment the  answer  was  a  never-care  refrain.  With 
each  song  Frane  grew  more  enthusiastic  till,  his 
mood  changing  with  hers,  she  turned  from  the 

144 


If  the  Pearls  Were  Real 

merry  to  the  quizzical  and,  finally,  to  the  melan- 
choly, all  unconscious,  seemingly,  of  her  audience. 

"Those  little  rhymes  touch  life  at  many  points," 
he  said. 

"Do  you  think  so?  The  French  ones  do.  My 
own?  They're  for  myself,  mostly.  The  words 
come  to  me  suddenly  and  I  never  change  them. 
Oh,  Arthur,"  she  turned  to  Carniston,  "I've  a  new 
one  which  I  don't  think  you  have  heard."  Arthur ! 
Carniston  started  and  visibly  reddened.  She  had 
never  addressed  him  as  Arthur  before  the  Bel- 
mores  and  their  friends.  "In  fact,  I  know  you've 
never  heard  it,  for  it  only  flashed  through  my  mind 
this  afternoon."     She  sang: 

"For  the  love  which  kings  in  courting  lost, 
For  the  treasure  rich  which  paid  the  cost, 

Never  care,  never  care. 
She  who  weeps  and  weeping  shows  her  tears, 
Better  laugh  and  call  the  stars  her  dears — 

Never  care,  never  care!" 

Such  was  the  nature  of  the  songs  that  had  pre- 
ceded it  that  to  none  of  the  others  did  the  allusion 
appear.  To  Carniston,  who  suffered  through  her 
charm,  which  he  had  found  specially  manifest  that 
afternoon,  its  symbolism  was  clear.  She  turned  to 
him  as  if  seeking  his  particular  opinion.  He  bit 
his  lip  and  said : 

145 


Lucy  of  the  Stars 

"Very  clever." 

"Why  the  pensive  never-cares,  Lucie  ?"  the 
doctor  asked.  "I  can  see  you  are  making  Carnis- 
ton  a  little  glum,  and  the  rest  of  us,  too,  I  think." 

Lucy  realised  how  dangerously  near  disclosure 
of  her  secret  the  temptation  of  watching  Arthur's 
expression  had  carried  her.  Fearful  lest  her 
father  suspected  the  truth,  she  now  sang  the  mer- 
riest chansons  in  her  repertoire. 

The  doctor  first  and  then  the  others  began  sing- 
ing the  refrains  with  her,  while  Belmore,  smiling, 
leaned  forward,  with  occasional  glances  toward 
Fanny  which  seemed  to  be  saying  that  they  had 
made  a  discovery.  It  was  he  who  thanked  her 
most  heartily  when  the  guests  rose  to  go  at  the 
sound  of  the  dinner-bugle. 

After  dinner  Lucy  went  absently  to  the  piano, 
and  again  she  sang  something  pensive.  The 
doctor  put  his  hands  over  hers  to  stop  their  playing. 

"You  take  me  back  to  days  in  Paris  that  were 
sad.  Merry  songs  become  you  best;  merry  songs 
are  best." 

She  broke  into  a  rollicking  peasants'  chorus. 
His  eyes  grew  brighter  and  he  settled  back  into  a 
chair,  softly  humming  the  music,  happy  and  con- 
templative. 

"Lucie,  you  were  not  meant  for  unhappiness," 
he  said  when  she  stopped.    "When  you  were  a  little 

146 


If  the  Pearls  Were  Real 

girl  I  used  to  say,  'She  shall  always  be  light  of 
heart.'  This,  indeed,  has  been  my  real  ambition 
in  life.    It  was  reparation  for — well,  never  mind." 

Then  it  occurred  to  him,  in  his  restored  mood  of 
playfulness,  that  he  wanted  to  see  where  she  kept 
the  necklace.  She  took  him  into  her  room  and 
showed  him  the  jeweller's  box  in  her  trunk,  which 
was  unlocked.  He  lifted  out  the  pearl  strands  and 
held  them  gleaming  against  his  fingers. 

"I'd  turn  the  key  when  I  was  out  of  the  room," 
he  admonished  her.     "They  might  be  stolen." 

"But  they  are  only  imitation,"  she  said.  "You 
carry  the  deception  farther  than  I  can.  I  only  be- 
lieve that  they  are  real  when  I  wear  them — al- 
though I  was  looking  at  them  again  yesterday,  and 
I  must  say  I  am  sure  no  one  could  tell  them  from 
a  genuine  string." 

He  had  then  almost  irresistibly  the  call  to  tell 
her  that  the  deceit  was  with  him  and  not  with  the 
necklace.  He  wanted  to  see  her  eyes  sparkle  when 
she  heard  of  the  wealth  he  had  garnered  for  her, 
and  that  the  cost  of  the  necklace  and  the  gowns 
and  the  trip  abroad  represented  only  the  odd 
figures  which  he  had  cast  out  in  his  calculation  of 
totals. 

But  this  would  be  self-gratification,  pure  and 
simple.  He  had  an  individual  precedent  which, 
in  your  life  and  mine  and  every  one's,  outweighs 

147 


Lucy  of  the  Stars 

general  impressions.  He  was  old,  and  so  he  had 
travelled  far  on  this  tangent.  Some  man  might 
seek  her  for  her  fortune,  and  money  had  cost  him 
his  happiness  in  youth.  It  was  to  him  the  curse 
of  the  modern  world.  He  had  won  it,  as  most  of 
us  do,  as  a  protection  from  the  curse,  and  in  the 
winning  the  thought  of  what  he  had  once  paid  for 
the  want  of  it  had  made  him  greedy. 

"I  shall  tell  her  one  of  these  times,  however, 
when  we  are  in  a  transport  of  happiness,"  he 
thought  before  he  went  to  sleep,  "if  only  to  see 
what  my  Lucie  of  infinite  variety  says  and  does 
when  she  hears  the  news." 


148 


XIV 

FANNY  BELMORE  BY  CHOICE 

B  ELMORE  knocked  at  his  wife's  door. 
"Is    it    proper?      May    I    come    in?"    he 
asked. 

"In  the  dressing-gown  you  picked  out  your- 
self," she  called  back. 

It  had  been  a  great  lark  when  they  had  set 
forth  in  a  hansom  to  buy  in  Regent  Street  and 
Bond  Street  certain  things  for  her  which  were  to 
his  fancy. 

The  heavy  silk  folds  were  thrown  back  from 
her  neck,  revealing  the  charm  of  lines  still  fresh 
from  girlhood  and  grown  softer  in  the  first  flush 
of  matronhood.  Fanny  Belmore  was  beautiful; 
her  worst  enemy  could  not  deny  her  this  dis- 
tinction. Lindley  felt  the  pride  and  the  joy  and 
the  glory  of  her. 

In  the  privacy  of  their  apartment  they  fell  to 
talking  of  the  trip  which  was  now  drawing  to  a 
close.  It  was  worth  while  going  abroad  once  in 
four  or  five  years,  not  oftener,  they  agreed.     On 

149 


Lucy  of  the  Stars 


the  whole,  for  the  two  steaming  summer  months 
the  camp  in  the  Adirondacks,  with  its  utter  seclu- 
sion and  abandon,  and  the  children — always  the 
children — was  best.  She  thought  that  the  trip  had 
done  him  good,  and  her  attitude  toward  him  was 
that  of  the  gentle  guardian  of  some  god. 

"You  were  happiest,  it  seemed  to  me,  when  we 
were  at  Burbridge,"  she  said.  "I  wondered  if  you 
did  not  envy  the  leisurely  life  of  an  English  country- 
place." 

"Fanny !     You  thought  that  of  me !" 

"Perhaps."  She  had  sat  down  beside  him  and 
was  leaning  her  head  on  his  shoulder. 

"I  was  brighter  because  I  was  seeing  that  it  is 
better  to  be  in  the  fight  than  to  be  an  automaton. 
At  least,  I  am  not  so  circumscribed  that  my  son 
must  be  trained  how  to  lose  a  fortune  rather  than 
how  to  preserve  one.  It  is  not  that  we  cannot  get 
out  of  the  fight,  Fanny,  but  that  we  love  it.  The 
fight  is  America.  Some  way,  on  my  return  this 
time,  I  feel  more  than  ever  glad  that  we  do  not 
accept  the  man  of  leisure  as  the  prop  of  State  and 
society." 

"Bravo!  Thank  heaven,  I'm  not  a  countess!" 
And  she  could  have  been  one  had  she  chosen.  "It's 
much  nicer  to  be  Fanny  Belmore,  of  Kearn's  Ford. 
The  foliage  will  be  red  and  gold  when  we  reach 
there,  and  the  air  will  be  wine.    The  home  town  is 

150 


Fanny  Belmore  by   Choice 

ours  and  America  is  ours,  though  John  Frane  will 
not  own  us  as  Americans  because  we  are  rich." 

"John  seems  to  like  the  newest  Americans  best 
— if  they  are  poor — but  we  like  the  old  best ;  and 
if  all  mothers  are  like  you" — Fanny  blushed — 
"they  will  not  perish  from  the  earth  for  some  time 
to  come." 

She  made  her  bow  to  the  compliment  and 
directly  turned  to  a  purely  woman's  topic.  Car- 
niston,  she  was  convinced,  had  come  to  America 
fortune-hunting,  and  already  she  thought  he  was 
making  love  to  Geraldine  in  his  cold,  British  way. 

"Geraldine  marry  a  title!  Impossible!"  he  ex- 
claimed. "Why,  she  was  meant  for  John.  That 
is  clear  as  daylight."  He  spoke  as  if  this  were  a 
part  of  his  plans. 

"John  loves  Geraldine,  I'm  sure,  in  his  way. 
He's  been  waiting  for  her,  I  think.  But  does  she 
love  him?"  Fanny  asked. 

"She  would  if  she  found  herself,"  said  Lindley. 

"Query!"  interjected  Fanny.  "Will  she  ever 
find  herself  with  her  mother  about?" 

She  set  out  to  impress  her  husband  with  the  idea 
that  there  was  no  telling  what  might  happen  if  the 
earl  was  persistent  in  his  attentions  and  Mrs. 
Hodges  became  petulant  and  active.  Lindley 
protested  that  he  could  not  go  to  John  and  say, 
"Propose  or  you  lose  her,"  or  to  Geraldine,  as  a 

151 


Lucy  of  the  Stars 

guardian,    and   say,    "Find   yourself   or  you   are 
lost." 

"Besides,  there's  no  immediate  danger,"  he 
added.  "Geraldine  and  her  mother  are  going  to 
Kearn's  Ford  for  a  month  before  they  go  to 
Washington.  If  the  earl  is  bent  on  courting  he 
must  come  where  we  will  be  on  watch." 

"I  shall  be,  not  you,"  she  rejoined.  "There's 
something  else,  too,  that  I've  found  out.  There 
are  two  other  people  on  this  steamer  who  are  in 
love  more  unrestrainedly,  more  preoccupiedly,  if 
not  more  deeply  than  we  are,  Lin — you  see  we  have 
so  much  to  distract  us ;  but  it  is  quite  imaginable  to 
you  and  me  how  love  might  be  the  only  thing  to 
a  person,  and  then  it's  pretty  hard  to  hide  it  from 
a  woman's  eye." 

"And  now?"  He  was  all  interest,  as  he  ever 
was  when  she  gave  the  results  of  her  feminine  ob- 
servation, which  was  discriminating  without  being 
malicious,  as  he  put  it. 

"The  earl  is  not  such  an  automaton  as  you 
think,"  she  declared.     "There  is  fire  in  him." 

"Fuel,  you  mean,  perhaps;  and  if  he  gets  proper 
combustion,  which  I  should  say  was  unlikely,  he 
may  not  die  of  dry  rot." 

"Sceptic!  Old  business-at-the-office-every-morn- 
ing-at-nine,  I  tell  you  he  loves  Lucy  von  Kar  and 
Lucy  von  Kar  loves  him." 

152 


Fanny  Belmore  by  Choice 

"She  is  too  clever,"  said  Belmore. 

"She  is  so  clever  that  if  she  did  love  she  would 
become  the  very  slave  of  love.  That  little  girl  is 
all  feeling,  and  it  is  her  feeling  and  her  art  which 
make  a  thing  said  by  her  or  done  by  her  fetching, 
when  said  or  done  by  another  it  would  be  common- 
place." 

"With  what  facts  do  you  justify  your  conclu- 
sions?" he  asked. 

"Booh!  With  something  better  than  facts — a 
woman's  intuition,  item  one,  which  comprehended 
another  woman's  glance,  item  two,  and  a  man's 
glance,  item  three.  I  saw  the  look  in  her  eyes  yes- 
terday afternoon  when  she  called  him  Arthur  and 
she  sang  that  new  never-care  song,  and  I  saw  the 
look  in  his  eyes,  too.  That  was  the  whole  story. 
The  mischief  and  the  daring  and  the  art  of  her — 
that  thing  which  meant  nothing  to  us  and  all  to 
him!" 

"Yes,  the  art  of  it.  I  almost  believe  you  are 
right  for  the  sake  of  the  story.  Possibly  he  has 
proposed  and  made  a  fool  of  himself,  and  she  takes 
this  way  of  laughing  at  him.  Anyway,  Fanny,  she 
is  ripping  company." 

The  man,  who  was  used  to  listening  coldly  to 
reports  and  propositions  from  others  and  making 
decisions  all  day  long,  liked  movement  and  vivac- 
ity.    The  finger-pricking  incident  he  intended  to 

153 


Lucy  of  the  Stars 

repeat  to  his  children  as  an  example  of  consideration 
for  the  feelings  of  others,  Mrs.  Hodges,  of  course, 
appearing  in  the  disguise  of  "a  certain  lady." 
From  the  moment  that  John  had  related  it  to  him 
Lucy  had  a  place  in  Lindley's  affections  which,  if 
rarely  given,  were  unchanging  in  their  loyalty. 

In  the  rehearsal  of  their  plans,  which  included 
two  months  at  home,  possibly  two  weeks'  hunting 
in  Virginia,  before  they  went  to  their  New  York 
house,  and  his  promise  to  be  absent  as  little  as  pos- 
sible, Lindley  mentioned  the  fact  that  Dr.  von  Kar 
would  have  to  come  to  Kearn's  Ford,  and  whether 
Lucy  was  to  come  with  him  or  not  was  a  thing  for 
Fanny  to  settle. 

"Of  course,  both  of  them;  and  they  are  to  stay 
as  long  as  they  please,"  she  said. 

This  was  precisely  what  he  wanted,  and  he  told 
her  once  more  that  she  was  the  most  delightful 
of  wives. 

"With  Geraldine,  it  will  make  a  fine  little  party, 
and  John,  too — if  it  weren't  for  this  State  cam- 
paign coming  on.  I  don't  suppose  we  shall  see 
much  of  him." 

As  they  were  to  learn  later,  however,  Mrs. 
Hodges,  thanks  to  the  infection  of  nobility,  had 
changed  her  mind  about  going  to  Kearn's  Ford  for 
the  autumn.  She  had  been  flattered  by  receiving 
morning  and  afternoon  an  inquiry  from  Carniston 

154 


Fanny  Belmore  by  Choice 

about  her  health.  Her  social  secretary,  with  a  de- 
sire to  please,  had  informed  her  that  his  lordship 
had  not  only  shown  great  interest  in  her,  but  was 
devoting  himself  conspicuously  to  Miss  Hodges. 
The  ambitious  mother  lay  in  bed  and  thought 
boldly  and  scolded  her  maid.  Mrs.  Hodges  won- 
dered why  she  could  never  keep  her  maids,  al- 
though she  paid  them  two  prices  and  had  such  an 
elegant  set  of  trunks  and  such  elegant  quarters  for 
them.  Geraldine  had  kept  her  maid  for  six  years, 
and  the  only  time  that  Marie  had  ever  given  notice 
was  when  she  had  been  transferred  to  Mrs. 
Hodges  for  a  month. 

On  this  last  day  the  maid  had  groomed  and  har- 
nessed her  and  assisted  her  on  deck.  Now  she  sat 
beside  Carniston  in  an  attitude  which,  while  com- 
fortable for  her  avoirdupois,  was  scarcely  graceful. 
When  she  took  this  attitude  she  always  reminded 
Frane  of  a  roast  goose  stuffed  and  served  on  a  gold 
platter,  with  cloth-of-gold  table-spread  and  nap- 
kins, and  a  band  of  cash  registers  playing  in  the 
conservatory.  She  had  been  talking  to  Carniston 
about  Geraldine  as  if  Geraldine  were  a  beautiful 
gown  in  a  shop  window. 

"We  should  like  to  open  our  house  in  Washing- 
ton at  once,  your  lordship,"  she  told  him.  "If  you 
will  be  our  guest,  we  can  arrange  to  lunch  at  the 
Waldorf  to-morrow,   and  then  we  can  go  right 

155 


Lucy  of  the  Stars 

along  to  the  capital  in  a  private  car  in  the  after- 
noon. You  will  find  that  our  trains  lack  privacy 
and  are  a  little  noisy.  You  see,  we  have  no  leisure 
class.  We  are  all  for  rush  and  business  in  Amer- 
ica. And  I  must  say,  though  I  am  an  American 
myself,  that  we  are  a  little  loud  in  our  ways."  She 
thought  that  she  was  saying  something  to  please 
him. 

The  earl  listened  to  her,  smiling  politely.  One 
of  her  words  kept  running  through  his  head — 
"elegant,"  in  description  of  a  dinner,  a  house,  a 
horse,  an  automobile,  or  of  anything  "real  swell." 

"Thank  you,"  he  said;  "you  are  very  gracious 
to  a  stranger.  I  shall  be  glad  to  come  on  the  train 
with  you,  but  really  I  have  promised  to  stop  with 
the  Ambassador,  who  is  an  old  friend  of  Lord 
Brent's." 


156 


XV 

A  MOMENT  WITHOUT  THE  GHOSTS 

THE  night  was  chill.  After  the  concert  one 
turn  around  the  deck  or  even  three  or  four 
deep  inhalations  from  the  saloon  doorway  was 
sufficient  for  the  average  passenger  who  sought  a 
breath  of  fresh  air.  Many  of  the  men,  their  hands 
deep  in  their  pockets,  steered  their  courses  for  the 
harbour  lights  of  the  smoking-room. 

John  Frane,  his  shoulders  swinging  with  the 
energy  of  his  stride,  paced  up  and  down,  sniffing 
the  battle  of  the  morrow.  For  weeks  he  had  been 
a  spectator  in  other  countries;  in  twelve  hours  he 
was  to  be  an  actor  again  in  his  own. 

"I  smell  Long  Island  already!"  he  cried  in  his 
enthusiasm,  as  he  overtook  Carniston,  who  had 
started  from  the  opposite  end  of  the  deck.  "You 
see,  I  feel  to-night  as  if  the  starter  were  telling  me 
to  get  ready.  Have  you  gone  in  for  politics  at 
all?" 

"I  thought  of  it  once,  but  took  up  with  science." 
The  Englishman's  indifference  was  not  as  deep  as 
it  seemed  to  the  American. 

157 


Lucy  of  the  Stars 

"In  your  country,"  said  Frane,  "I  believe  that 
you  can  be  in  politics  on  odd  Wednesday  and  Sat- 
urday matinees,  if  you  like.  It's  not  that  way  with 
us.  You  must  give  yourself  up  to  it,  as  you  do  to 
the  love  of  a  woman.  And  you  can  do  things  over 
there  which  are  all  according  to  precedent,  while 
if  one  did  them  in  America  the  public  would  shout 
graft  and  nepotism." 

"Americans  seem  to  love  their  women  thor- 
oughly, at  all  events.  I  hear  that  when  an  Ameri- 
can leaves  school  and  is  without  fortune,  position, 
or  anything,  he  will  become  engaged  to  a  girl  and 
she  will  wait  for  him  until  he  has  made  a  place 
for  her,"  Carniston  pursued,  changing  the  subject. 

"Yes,  that  is  an  English  middle-class  character- 
istic which  we  preserve.  Our  pioneers  used  to  go 
into  the  wilderness  and  make  a  clearing  and  build  a 
cabin  and  grow  a  crop,  and  then  return  for  the 
girl." 

Lucy,  in  furs  which  were  most  becoming,  ap- 
peared in  the  doorway  just  as  they  were  passing. 
When  she  fell  in  with  them  John  repeated  to  her 
his  remark  about  the  pioneer. 

"We  have  several  examples  on  board,"  he  con- 
tinued. "One  is  pronounced.  You  notice  the  lady 
with  three  huge  gold  nuggets  arranged  for  a 
breast-pin,  and  her  husband  with  a  big  nugget  in 
his  scarf  and  another  for  a  watch-charm.    To  the 

158 


A  Moment  Without  the   Ghosts 

second  and  third  generations,  who  show  the  van- 
ity of  possession  in  other  ways,  these  are  a  little 
vulgar,  of  course." 

"Yes,  they  seemed  what  you  call  the  limit,  Mr. 
Frane,"  said  Lucy,  "till  I  saw  how  devoted  he  was 
to  her  and  how  she  worshipped  him,  and  then  I 
made  her  acquaintance  and  she  introduced  him 
to  me." 

"And  you  found  out  how  she  cooked  his  grub 
for  him  in  camp  and  how  at  last  he  won  out,"  said 
Frane. 

"Made  his  pile,  you  mean,"  said  Lucy.  "That 
is  another  new  one — new  one  on  me,  I  mean  to  say 
— that  I  have  learned  to-day.  I  think  I  know  the 
story  of  every  nugget.  He  is  not  half  so  bad  as 
some  of  our  mediaeval  ancestors  who  boasted  and 
swore  and  hired  scriveners  to  lie  about  their 
deeds.  The  idea  that  this  couple  express  is  as 
beautiful  and  heroic  as  any  of  knighthood  days. 
With  the  knights,  only  the  stories,  not  their  man- 
ners, survive." 

"Do  you  realise  that — you  who  fairly  exhale 
Europe?"  said  Frane.  "There  is  hope  for  you  to 
become  an  American  yet." 

"Oh,  I  think  many  Europeans  could  see  the 
point,"  said  Carniston,  quietly  and  incisively. 

"But  I  foresee,"  John  resumed,  "that  Mr.  and 
Mrs.  Nuggets  will  soon  be  unhappy.    They  have 

159 


Lucy  of  the  Stars 

left  their  daughter  abroad.  She  is  their  only  child, 
and  they  are  making  a  great  sacrifice  in  being  sep- 
arated from  her.  But  she  must  have  a  French  edu- 
cation so  that  she  will  have  nothing  in  common 
with  them.  Soon  the  mother  will  be  correcting 
her  husband's  grammar  and  manners.  Then  she 
will  want  a  taste  of  what  is  called  society,  and  their 
unhappiness  will  be  complete.  You  see,  Carniston, 
we  make  in  one  generation  what  with  you  requires 
three  or  four  generations.  It  is  ambition,  it  is 
progress,  and  sometimes  it's  pretty  hard  on  both 
the  first  and  the  second  generations." 

All  three  were  thinking  of  Mrs.  Hodges  and 
Geraldine,  but  each  was  careful  not  to  mention 
either. 

"However,  the  Belmores  accomplished  it  beau- 
tifully," John  continued.  "There,  the  father  was 
a  joy  to  the  son  and  the  son  a  joy  to  the  father. 
Lindley  is  the  refined  salt  of  our  American  earth." 

"It  seems  to  me,"  observed  Lucy,  "that  the  want 
of  money  on  the  part  of  gentle  people,  so  called, 
produces  quite  as  much  misery  as  the  possession  of 
it  on  the  part  of  the  vulgar  people,  so  called.  Mrs. 
Nuggets  said  that  Mr.  Nuggets'  motto  had  always 
been,  'Give  me  the  root.'  When  I  asked  her  what 
she  meant  by  that,  she  laughed  at  my  ignorance. 
'Of  all  evil,  of  course,'  she  said;  which  I  took  to 
be  another  way  of  saying  that  you  want  to  make 

1 60 


A   Moment  Without  the  Ghosts 

your  pile,  and  it  strikes  me  as  a  very  good  motto, 
indeed.    What  do  you  think,  Arthur?" 

"Decidedly,  yes,"  he  said  shakily,  and  imme- 
diately invented  an  excuse  for  going  below. 

"I  like  him  after  all,"  the  irrepressible  Frane 
continued.  "You  can't  help  liking  Englishmen  of 
his  sort,  if  for  no  other  reason  than  that,  although 
they  are  so  starched,  they  always  look  so  clean.  I 
like  them,  too,  for  their  courage  in  laughing  a  min- 
ute after  everybody  else  has  seen  the  joke." 

"Oh,  that  American  delusion  is  explained  by  the 
Englishman's  inborn  politeness.  It  isn't  that  he 
doesn't  see  the  joke  at  once;  it  is  that  he  rarely 
does  more  than  smile  over  the  best  of  stories. 
He  can't,  as  you  say,  on  account  of  the  starch. 
When  he  is  with  Americans  and  sees  that  they  are 
laughing,  why,  out  of  duty  to  the  custom  of  the 
country,  he  joins  in  the  guffaw — but  a  little  tardily, 
of  course." 

"How  does  it  happen,  then,  that  his  face  is  per- 
fectly blank  till  he  laughs?"  John  asked. 

"Oh,  you  mean  American  jokes!"  said  Lucy. 
"He  has  finished  his  smile  and  looked  away  from 
the  story-teller  before  you  begin  laughing.  I  must 
be  going  in  now.     Good-night." 

"I  surrender!"  he  called  after  her.  Then  he 
went  into  the  smoking-room,  where  he  managed  to 
be  pleasant  to  all  the  different  groups  without  tak- 

161 


Lucy  of  the  Stars 

ing  more  than  one  drink.  When  he  fell  asleep  he 
was  in  a  happier  frame  of  mind  than  he  had  known 
for  weeks;  which  was  true  of  nearly  every  other 
American  passenger.  To-morrow  they  would  hear 
what  had  happened  at  their  offices,  and  they  would 
poultice  the  places  lame  from  idleness  with  the 
harness  of  duty.  Not  every  American  passenger, 
to  be  exact ;  particularly,  not  Lindley  Belmore.  He 
would  have  liked  another  quiet  week  in  which  to 
adore  Fanny. 

Having  laid  aside  her  cloak  and  sent  her  maid 
to  bed,  Lucy  tried  to  read  a  novel.  But  the  ghosts 
came  and  put  films  over  her  eyes  so  that  she  could 
not  see  the  lines.  With  the  morrow  throwing  her 
and  Arthur  apart  and  Geraldine  and  him  together, 
her  love  touched  depths  that  were  bitter.  She  was 
angry ;  she  was  crying  out  against  fate. 

"Mr.  and  Mrs.  Nuggets  have  so  much  more 
money  than  they  need,"  she  thought.  "If  it  is 
going  to  make  them  unhappy,  why  shouldn't  I 
have  half  of  it?  Then  they  would  be  happy  and 
I  should  be  happy,  too.  Instead  of  being  the  re- 
ward of  the  gift  of  acquisitiveness,  money  should 
go  by  dispensation  to  those  who  know  how  to  use 
it.    Arthur  and  I  do. 

"And  if  I  had  money — money,  money,  money!" 
she  cried,  beating  the  arm-chairs  with  her  fists, 
"then  I  could  tell  Arthur  that  I  had  it — no,  not 

162 


A  Moment  Without  the  Ghosts 

until  I  had  won  him  back !  And  what  joy  it  would 
be  to  win  him  back,  to  make  him  for  love  of  me 
give  up  everything  else  before  I  gave  him  all  the 
money — all,  all — and  myself.  And  this  Mr.  Bel- 
more,  this  great  lord  of  the  American  aristoc- 
racy, I  can  see  that  he  has  so  much  money  that 
it  keeps  him  away  from  the  shrine  of  his  lovely 
wife.  It's  all  unfair  and  wicked!  I  feel  like  an 
anarchist." 

She  put  on  her  coat  and  went  on  deck  again. 
Was  she  glad  or  was  she  sorry  when  she  found 
that  Carniston  also  had  returned?  Was  he  glad 
or  was  he  sorry  when  he  saw  her  coming  toward 
him  on  the  long  promenade  which  was  wholly  de- 
serted, with  the  darkness  tempered  by  an  occasional 
deck  light? 

"It  is  the  excitement  of  the  anticipation  of  the 
new  land  to-morrow,  I  suppose,"  she  said,  as  she 
joined  him. 

"Yes;  I  also,  after  I  went  below,  felt  that  even 
if  I  did  go  to  bed  I  should  only  lie  awake,  and 
concluded  to  keep  on  pacing  till  I  was  really  sleepy. 
The  Americans  have  finished  taking  their  exercise 
in  the  smoking-room,"  he  added,  a  little  contemp- 
tuously. "I  suppose  they  are  thinking  of  the  money 
they  are  going  to  make  next  year.  It  seems  so 
easy  for  them  to  make  it."  He  also  felt  like  an 
anarchist. 

163 


Lucy  of  the  Stars 

"But  think  of  the  heroism  of  Mr.  Nuggets,"  she 
said  thoughtfully. 

"Yes,"  he  answered  bitterly.  "Mr.  Nuggets 
had  a  great  advantage  in  not  being  born  in  the 
peerage." 

They  walked  in  silence  for  several  turns,  her 
buoyant  step  giving  life  to  his  own.  Was  it  only 
the  pleasure  of  hearing  her  voice  or  was  it  the  mar- 
vel of  a  fortune  which  a  self-made  man  had  won 
that  excited  his  imagination  and  led  him  to  ask  her 
to  tell  the  story  as  Mrs.  Nuggets  had  told  it? 

Before  she  began  she  took  his  arm  in  a  way  that 
was  unconstrained  and  natural.  Literally  but 
kindly  she  reproduced  Mrs.  Nuggets,  for  her  mim- 
icry had  that  rare  quality  which  amuses  without 
wounding.  When  she  reached  the  heroic  part  she 
dropped  the  dialect  and  proceeded  in  her  soft 
English,  with  the  slightest  of  German  r's  and  the 
slightest  of  French  Vs.  It  was  she  who  was  living 
in  the  cabin  through  the  long  winter,  and  it  seemed 
to  him  as  if  it  were  he  who  was  with  her. 

"Wasn't  it  beautiful?"  she  asked  finally,  when 
the  fortune  had  been  found. 

"Beautiful!  Like  a  story-book — beautiful! 
You  make  anything  beautiful,  Lucy,"  he  answered. 
"If  it  weren't  that  I  have  only  six  months,"  he 
thought,  "if  there  weren't  this  estate,  if  the  money 
on  which  I  am  living  were  only  not  borrowed  on 

164 


A  Moment  Without  the  Ghosts 

the  strength  of  this  thing  which  I  am  expected  to 
do  !"  Then  he  looked  down  upon  her  in  the  stern- 
ness of  self-denial,  while  there  were  such  lights  in 
his  eyes  as  sometimes  make  havoc  of  resolutions. 

"Are  we  to  be  thrown  together  constantly  over 
here?"  he  asked  suddenly,  almost  as  much  of  him- 
self as  of  her. 

"I  don't  know,  Arthur.  How  can  I  tell?  I  am 
with  father,"  she  responded. 

"And  if  you  do  see  me,  are  you  going  to  call  me 
Arthur  always?"  he  asked. 

"Probably  I  shall.  I  told  myself  that  I 
wouldn't,  but  I  find  it  natural." 

She  drew  herself  closer  to  him.  His  hand 
slipped  back  till  it  grasped  hers.  She  did  not  re- 
sist. Under  the  illusion  of  the  moment  his  ghosts 
and  hers  had  been  carried  away  to  the  Pole.  The 
Oceanic  was  their  yacht.  The  ocean  was  theirs 
and  the  land  was  theirs — a  land  without  stock 
exchanges,  banks,  or  remittances,  a  land  dedicated 
to  the  joy  of  living,  where  you  dug  a  spadeful  of 
money  whenever  the  tree  of  love  needed  fresh 
earth.  They  did  not  speak  again.  On  and  on 
they  walked,  till  from  sheer  fatigue  she  stopped 
at  the  door.  At  the  passageway  to  her  cabin  he 
bent  quickly  and  kissed  her  on  the  cheek.  He  saw 
her  smiling  as  she  struck  him  with  her  muff  and 
was  gone. 

i65 


XVI 

BACK  IN  AMERICA 

FOR  the  first  time  in  six  days  the  engines  had 
ceased  throbbing;  the  chains  roaringly  let 
the  anchor  down  in  the  mud  off  quarantine;  and 
the  leviathan  which  had  laid  her  path  straight 
across  the  waves  swung  aimlessly  on  the  harbour 
tide. 

Frane  nodded  toward  the  city  which  lay  hidden 
in  the  morning  haze,  and  promised  Lucy  revela- 
tions in  an  hour;  he  nodded  toward  the  vista  of 
wooden  cottages  on  Staten  Island  as  a  scene  dis- 
tinctly American. 

"There  is  also  something  distinctly  American," 
said  Lindley — "those  men  coming  up  the  gang- 
way. Thanks  to  them,  we  shall  know  in  the  after- 
noon papers  the  names  of  the  notabilities  among 
our  thousand  passengers,  not  to  mention  what  axes 
some  of  them  have  to  grind  on  the  back  of  the 
public." 

"He  means  the  reporters,"  John  put  in.  "Lin 
does  not  know  how  to  talk  to  them.  There  ought 
to  be  a  course  in  that  in  our  colleges.     Some  of 

1 66 


Back  in   America 

our  greatest  statesmen  and  financiers  have  no  other 
stock  in  trade.  Lin  always  stands  guard  in  such  a 
way  that  people  are  taking  the  good  deed  he  has 
in  his  closet  for  a  skeleton." 

The  newspaper  men  made  straight  for  the 
group  composed  of  the  Belmores,  the  von  Kars, 
Frane  and  Carniston.  As  if  by  some  prearranged 
plan  they  separated  into  two  firing  squads,  which 
advanced  on  the  millionaire  and  the  politician. 
Lucy  noted  curiously  the  contrast  in  the  manner 
of  the  two  men  whom  they  assailed.  Belmore  fell 
back  awkwardly  on  his  defence.  He  spoke  in 
monosyllables;  he  was  trying  to  be  courteous  and 
he  had  nothing  to  say.  Frane  shook  hands  warmly 
with  two  of  his  squad,  whom  he  called  by  their 
first  names.  The  rest  he  immediately  took  into 
camp.  He  did  not  have  to  ask  them  the  news. 
They  knew  that  he  must  know  the  situation  of  the 
hour  before  they  could  put  their  own  questions. 
In  short,  electric  sentences  which  were  more  like 
a  series  of  signals  than  an  exposition,  they  told 
him  the  inside  story — such  as  they  would  tell  their 
friends  but  never  print — of  all  that  had  transpired 
in  the  past  week. 

So  far  as  Lucy  could  make  out,  there  had  been 
a  sudden  set  of  sentiment  in  the  State  toward  John 
as  the  one  candidate  for  governor  whom  his  party 
could  elect.    The  newspaper  men  believed  that  old 

167 


Lucy  of  the  Stars 

Boss  Kennan  would  support  him  rather  than  let  the 
party  be  defeated.  What  did  John  think?  How 
did  he  stand  on  all  these  late  developments  which 
had  angered  the  people?    Would  he  accept? 

"Of  course  I  would  like  to  be  a  candidate  for 
governor,"  he  said.  "I  will  accept  if  the  people 
want  me  and  if  there  is  no  string  to  the  nomina- 
tion. So  Boss  Kennan  favours  me?  I  am  de- 
lighted to  hear  it.  I  want  the  support  of  every 
man  I  can  get — but  no  strings.' ' 

But  no  strings !  The  newspaper  men  noted  the 
phrase.  They  were  the  vehicle  that  carried  his 
thought  to  the  public  whose  servant  he  was;  and 
the  energy  and  earnestness  of  his  words  were  such 
as  to  indicate  that  the  millions  who  were  to  read 
his  interview  were  actually  within  sound  of  his 
voice. 

The  squad  which  had  been  with  Belmore  had 
found  no  copy,  and  they  had  left  him  for  the  earl, 
who  expected,  from  the  anecdotes  he  had  heard 
of  American  reporters,  that  they  would  ask  him 
before  he  landed  how  he  liked  Chicago;  but  they 
only  wanted  to  know  his  destination,  and  when  he 
told  them  they  left,  with  the  exception  of  one  man 
who  was  doing  a  "feature"  for  a  "yellow."  He 
asked  Carniston  if  he  knew  Lord  Dingwall,  and 
Carniston  responded  drily  that  he  did,  slightly. 
Did  Carniston  think  that  Anglo-American  mar- 

168 


Back  in  America 

riages  were  happy,  as  a  rule?  Carniston  re- 
sponded still  more  drily  that  he  knew  of  a  number 
of  very  happy  ones.  Then  the  reporter  came  to 
the  point.  His  paper  had  been  tipped  from  Lon- 
don that  Lady  Dingwall  was  going  to  apply  for  a 
divorce.  Was  this  true?  Who  was  the  co- 
respondent? After  these  questions,  the  "feature 
man"  for  the  "yellow"  realised  that  the  British 
stare  was  no  invention  of  actors  or  story-writers. 

"Do  you  go  about  in  this  way  all  your  life," 
Carniston  asked,  half  humourously,  half  eagerly, 
"asking  questions  about  people's  private  affairs 
and  jotting  down  what  you  hear  on  a  piece  of 
paper?" 

In  his  own  words  to  the  editor  afterwards,  this 
retort  made  the  inquisitor  "hot." 

"I  don't  need  a  valet  to  tell  rroe  when  to  come 
in  out  of  the  rain,"  he  shot  back,  and  then  went 
promptly. 

Catching  Miss  Hodges'  eye  at  this  moment, 
Lucy  for  the  first  time  thought  it  possible  that  the 
statuesque  Geraldine  had  a  sense  of  humour.  As 
for  Mrs.  Hodges,  she  was  in  one  of  her  states  of 
outraged  feeling,  which  was  signalised  by  the  ele- 
vated expression  of  her  rather  short  nose.  She  ex- 
pressed her  regret  that  in  America  there  was  no 
privacy.  Carniston  laughed  good-naturedly  and 
said  that  this  specimen  had  really  puzzled  him 

169 


Lucy  of  the  Stars 

very  much,  and  he  asked  Frane  how  to  avoid  such 
questions. 

"You  must  know,"  he  added,  "for  I  noticed 
they  did  not  ask  you  about  your  own  or  your 
friends'  private  affairs." 

"Oh,  I  was  talking  with  the  regular  men,"  he 
said.  "They  are  trustworthy,  efficient,  and  self- 
respecting.  I  am  a  public  man  and  they  expected 
me  to  talk  about  public  affairs.  You  see,  this  other 
man  took  you,  from  your  title,  to  belong  to  what 
we  call  Society  in  America,  and  he  expected  you 
to  talk  on  society.  Society  largely  makes  its  private 
affairs  public.  That  is  its  occupation" — and  your 
personal  view,  John,  as  Lindley  would  say. 

"I  noticed  that  the  reporters  were  quizzing  Mr. 
Belmore  too.  Financial  affairs  are  also  more  or 
less  public,  it  seems,"  said  the  doctor. 

"However,  publicity  is  scarcely  the  occupation 
of  financiers,"  John  responded.  "You  will  soon 
have  a  glimpse  of  the  beehive  where  they  work; 
you  will  see  what  a  people  who  send  reporters  out 
to  quarantine  to  get  our  views  have  produced  in 
the  way  of  a  great  city." 

By  the  time  the  Oceanic  was  under  way  the 
flight  of  the  ferry-boats  with  the  workers  was  at 
its  height.  The  haze  had  lifted.  Like  so  many 
forts  of  industry,  their  windows  loopholes,  the  sky- 
scrapers lay  clear  in  the  morning  light. 

170 


Back  in  America 

"I  didn't  know  before  that  America  was  such  a 
crowded  country  that  you  had  to  build  into  the 
air,"  said  Lucy. 

"A  passion  of  a  people  in  the  heyday  of  their 
energy,"  said  Dr.  von  Kar.  "The  Egyptians,  who 
lived  on  sandy  levels,  defied  nature  with  the  pyra- 
mids. Unable  to  compete  with  the  Persians  in 
luxury,  the  Greeks  turned  the  marble  of  their 
sterile  land  into  sculpture.  The  Roman  emperors 
built  aqueducts  which  they  named  after  themselves. 
Here,  we  have  the  monuments  which  individualism 
conquering  the  resources  of  a  new  country  raises  to 
its  pride." 

"What  with  father's  lectures  and  Mr.  Frane's 
speeches  we  shall  surely  be  well  informed,"  said 
Lucy,  twinkling. 

"I've  trained  Lucy  to  stop  me  when  I  have  made 
a  certain  number  of  revolutions,"  returned  the  doc- 
tor, laughing. 

"We  are  all  pleased  at  being  reminded  of  our 
youth,"  John  observed.  "It  is  far  better  to  be  on 
the  rise,  boastful  of  your  to-morrows,  than  on  the 
decline,  passing  from  action  to  well-mannered  re- 
flection on  mighty  yesterdays." 

Lucy  said  it  must  be  the  to-morrows  which  in- 
spired the  fellow  and  the  girl  who  waited  while 
he  built  the  cabin  and  made  the  clearing.  Her 
eyes  lighted  with  the  allusion. 

171 


Lucy  of  the  Stars 

"There  you  have  the  idea  still  in  its  working," 
said  Frane,  nodding  toward  the  notched  skyline 
as  if  he  loved  it  and  it  stood  for  America — his 
America.  "If  you  should  make  a  cross-section  of 
one  of  those  sky-scrapers  you  would  have  the  scenes 
of  a  hundred  little  plays,"  he  continued,  "the  story 
of  a  thousand  enterprises  which  concern  some  one's 
ambition  and  happiness.  As  you  cross  the  traffic- 
gorged  and  traffic-roaring  river  on  a  winter's  after- 
noon at  dusk,  every  window  sets  a  light  in  the  wall 
of  darkness  and  it  is  more  splendid  than  the  stars, 
for  even  our  imagination  cannot  tell  us  what  is 
behind  them.  Each  light  here  is  some  watch-fire 
for  some  hearth-fire." 

"And  when  the  man  has  the  money  to  get  the 
girl  of  his  choice,  what  then?"  Lucy  asked. 

"He  keeps  on  working  to  buy  her  a  better  house 
and  more  diamonds.  Maybe  he  wants  to  stop,  but 
he  can't;  it  is  the  game.  In  America  the  game  is 
irresistible." 

"And  they  play  to  the  score?"  she  asked. 

"Always." 

The  Oceanic,  now  opposite  her  pier,  had  become 
the  helpless  sailor  in  the  landsman's  hands.  When 
those  hard-bred  gamins,  the  river-tugs,  had  nosed 
her  into  her  slip,  her  guests  left  her  empty  and, 
her  contract  filled,  she  sent  their  baggage  crashing 
after  them.     From  the  bridge  the  officers  looked 

172 


Back  in  America 

down  not  upon  one  but  a  thousand  tempests ;  upon 
the  secrets  of  a  thousand  wardrobes  laid  bare. 

How  many  friendships  formed  aboard  ship 
have  ended  by  fate's  decree  rather  than  by  human 
wish  in  that  dark  pier  shed  which  brings  one's 
thoughts  from  the  freedom  of  the  sea  to  the  limi- 
tations of  daily  routine!  Lucy's  glance  and  Car- 
niston's  met  as  he  was  going  away  with  the  Hodges. 
She  waved  her  hand  to  him  almost  but  not  quite 
as  if  she  were  waving  him  a  farewell  kiss,  and  he 
sent  her  a  signal  in  kind  in  response.  He  was  too 
far  away  to  see  that  there  were  tears  in  her  eyes 
at  this  definite  parting  of  their  ways. 


173 


XVII 

THE  LOVE  OF  THE   PEOPLE 

AN  emissary  of  the  boss  whom  Frane  had 
fought  in  many  conventions  and  caucuses 
met  him  at  the  pier.  The  two  walked  away  to- 
gether, the  one  affable  and  impressive,  the  other 
singularly  disinterested.  Lucy  did  not  see  John 
again  until  two  minutes  before  train  time,  when  he 
came  aboard  Belmore's  car  at  Jersey  City  with  all 
the  evening  papers  and  half  a  dozen  magazines 
under  his  arm. 

"You  aren't  a  spectator  now,"  she  observed. 
"You're  in  the  battle." 

"Yes,  quite,  and  for  every  minute  of  the  weeks 
to  come.  I  was  thirsty  for  it,  I  can  tell  you,  after 
six  weeks  of  rising  every  morning  with  nothing  to 
do  and  going  to  bed  every  night  with  nothing 
done." 

Separated  from  Carniston  forever — so  she  told 
herself  then — seeking,  in  a  strange  land,  the  pass- 
ing excitement  which  should  divert  her  from  those 
ghosts  which  ought  not  to  come  and  had  no  business 
to  come  and  yet  would  come,  she  found  her  interest 

174 


The  Love  of  the  People 

centered  in  the  game  that  John  was  playing.  There 
was  something  in  his  energy,  his  magnetism,  his 
rapidity  of  thought,  his  many-sidedness  which 
caught  her  humour  at  a  time  when  her  one  aim 
was  to  be  objective. 

With  Madame  de  Stael  she  might  have  said 
that  she  would  travel  far  to  meet  a  clever  human 
being  when  she  could  not  look  out  of  the  window 
at  the  Bay  of  Naples.  Crossing  on  the  ferry  she 
had  been  reading  what  the  reporters  said  about 
John,  while  she  scarcely  heard  her  father's  ques- 
tions to  Belmore  asking  explanation  of  the  new 
things  they  were  seeing.  Already  her  quick  per- 
ception understood  John's  programme  and  his 
situation.  He  was  truly,  if  war  for  your  fellow- 
man  and  for  happy  and  clean  living  instead  of  grim 
selfishness  be  right,  making  a  good  fight.  She 
wanted  him  to  win.  She  would  like  to  shout  and 
to  work  for  him. 

"There  you  are!"  he  cried.  "  *  No  strings'  in 
every  headline!  It  shows  what  the  people  want, 
doesn't  it?  I  wonder  how  the  boss  will  receive  the 
news  when  his  minister  plenipotentiary  tells  him 
that  he  can  find  me  at  Kearn's  Ford  if  he  wishes  to 
see  me."  Then  he  dropped  the  subject  of  himself 
and  held  out  a  copy  of  one  of  the  sheaf  of  evening 
editions  mischievously  to  the  doctor.  "That's  our 
very  yellowest,  the  original  colour  fount  from  which 

J75 


Lucy  of  the  Stars 

all  the  yellows  of  the  world  have  been  drawn.  We 
lead  in  everything,  you  see.  It  has  its  merits.  It 
stands  for  more  schools  and  more  parks,  as  well  as 
a  headless  public  hurrah ;  but,  esoterically,  it  is  for 
more  circulation  and  the  substitution  of  feudalism 
for  democracy  and  pulp-made,  machine-printed 
thought  for  individual  thinking.  By  debauching 
and  weakening  the  public  mind  it  is  making  the 
public  more  easily  controllable  by  wealth.  Yet  Lin 
won't  look  at  it.  I  hope  that  you  have  not  the 
same  feeling  on  the  subject,  doctor." 

"I  have  never  read  the  yellows  in  England," 
said  the  doctor,  laughing.  "As  a  student  of  a  for- 
eign land  which  is  new  to  me,  I  suppose  I  ought 
to  neglect  nothing." 

"Precisely.  We  have  found  that  it  is  a  custom 
of  foreign  commentators  to  see  the  good  in  their 
country  and  the  bad  in  ours.  However,  I  find  my- 
self doing  the  same.  I  have  no  use  for  a  man  who 
does  not  think  his  own  country  the  best.  I  think 
that  mine  is." 

The  doctor  ran  his  eye  over  the  pages  with  some- 
thing of  the  curiosity  of  a  scholar  deciphering  the 
bad  Latin  of  street  gamins  on  the  walls  of  Pompeii. 

"Apparently,  the  idea  is  that  he  who  runs  must 
read,"  he  said  as  he  returned  the  specimen,  with 
the  huge  black  letters  of  "Divorce"  turned  toward 
Frane. 

176 


The  Love  of  the  People 

"It's  the  one  paper  where  I  didn't  get  the  spread 
to-day.  Carniston's  interview  beat  mine,"  John 
said,  as  he  did  the  revolutionary  thing  of  reading 
the  matter  under  the  headline.  "It  says  that,  of 
course,  Lord  Carniston  would  not  talk  about 
the  impending  divorce  suit  of  his  friend  Lord 
Dingwall." 

"But  Lord  Dingwall  is  not  his  friend,"  said 
Lucy,  in  a  sudden  burst  of  loyalty  to  Carniston. 
"They  are  of  wholly  different  types.  They 
scarcely  know  each  other." 

"Oh,  I  am  reading  what  the  paper  says,"  said 
Frane;  "  'but  Lady  Dingwall's  feelings  are  well 
known,'  the  story  continues,  'and  it  is  hinted  that 
Lord  Carniston  comes  as  an  emissary  to  her  par- 
ents to  persuade  them  to  bring  their  influence  to 
bear  on  their  daughter.' 

"Now  let  us  see  how  Lin  came  out  with  his  in- 
terview. He  does  not  get  so  much  space  as  the 
earl  and  myself,  because  he  is  as  powerful  as  fifty 
of  us.  There  you  have  it.  The  reporter  says  that 
the  magnate  condescended  to  say  that,  although 
there  was  a  strike,  the  people  would  receive  their 
winter's  supply  of  coal  at  the  usual  rates.  But  I 
know  that  before  he  made  this  statement  he  had  to 
consider  the  powers  of  his  own  world,  which  he 
would  have  to  oppose  in  order  to  gain  his  end.  If 
he  had  had  my  collegiate  course  in  the  art  of  talking 

177 


Lucy  of  the  Stars 

to  reporters  he  would  have  said  the  same  thing  in 
a  way  to  have  won  the  applause  of  the  land,  and 
then  possibly  he  wouldn't  have  needed  to  give  the 
coal,  judging  from  the  methods  of  some  million- 
aires.   Lin,  you  are  no  politician,"  he  called. 

"I  know  it,"  said  Belmore,  smiling.  He  had  not 
yet  glanced  at  the  evening  papers. 

Fanny  then  reminded  all  that  luncheon  was 
ready.  When  they  rose  from  the  table  they  were 
just  being  drawn  out  of  the  Philadelphia  station. 
Lindley  did  not  return  to  his  work  with  his  secre- 
tary. He  kept  glancing  at  his  watch  and  mention- 
ing the  time  yet  to  elapse  before  their  arrival,  and 
both  he  and  his  wife  were  palpably  so  preoccupied 
that  finally  Fanny  explained  that  they  were  count- 
ing the  minutes  till  they  should  see  the  children. 
As  the  train  came  to  a  standstill  in  the  station, 
John  and  Edward  and  Margaret  bolted  from  their 
nurses  and  stormed  the  steps  of  the  car. 

Parents  and  offspring  were  in  a  flurry  of  em- 
braces and  kisses,  while  the  attention  of  the  doctor 
and  Lucy  was  attracted  to  a  crowd  fairly  filling 
the  station  enclosure.  Three  banners,  one  in- 
scribed "With  Frane  We  Win  Again,"  another 
with  "Welcome  Home,  John,"  and  still  another 
with  "Our  Next  Governor,"  were  shaken  over  the 
heads  of  Frane's  fellow-townspeople,  who  broke 
into  a  hurrah  as  he  appeared  on  the  platform, 

i78 


The  Love  of  the  People 

while  the  local  band  played  "See  the  Conquering 
Hero  Comes,"  and  a  committee  of  citizens  stepped 
forward  to  receive  the  hero  himself. 

"It's  something  to  be  loved  like  that  right  in 
your  own  town  where  you  are  known,"  John  whis- 
pered to  Lucy,  who  saw  that  his  eyes  were  moist. 

On  the  edge  of  the  perfervid  demonstration  the 
Belmore  family  formed  a  quiet  scene  apart.  Dr. 
von  Kar  remarked  philosophically  that  this  con- 
trast was  something  worthy  of  comment  in  his 
diary.  The  brake  carrying  the  adults  and  the 
automobile  with  the  children  had  to  take  a  by- 
street to  avoid  the  procession  of  John's  admirers, 
who  were  leading  him  to  the  Ford  House,  where 
he  was  to  make  a  speech  from  the  balcony.  Facing 
their  parents,  the  children  were  standing  on  the 
seats  of  the  car  under  the  restraining  hands  of  the 
nurse,  while  they  shouted  alternate  questions  and 
bits  of  information  about  the  health  of  the  family 
horses  and  dogs. 

"It's  something  to  be  loved  like  that,"  said  Bel- 
more  to  Lucy,  who  saw  that  the  children  meant  to 
him  all  that  the  love  of  the  people  did  to  Frane. 

When  they  passed  through  a  gate  with  a  lodge 
beside  it  and  went  up  the  winding  drive,  it  seemed 
to  the  visitors  that  they  were  on  an  English  estate. 
At  the  steps  the  children  did  not  wait  for  the  door 
of  the  car  to  be  opened.    They  began  to  climb  over 

179 


Lucy  of  the  Stars 


the  back,  with  the  result  that  Margaret,  the  young- 
est, was  caught  by  the  skirt  in  time  to  be  saved 
from  landing  face  downward  in  the  gravel  of  the 
drive.  They  formed  around  their  father  and  in- 
sisted that  he  should  carry  each  in  turn  on  his  shoul- 
ders into  the  house.  This  he  did  with  the  meek- 
ness of  a  millionaire  when  he  finds  himself,  as  he 
explained,  in  the  face  of  a  "hold-up"  by  a  "com- 
bination." 

Until  their  supper-time  Oakwood  was  a  chil- 
dren's empire.  To-morrow  they  knew  that  the 
regimen  of  the  nursery  and  of  tutorship  would  be- 
gin again.  They  made  the  most  of  the  occasion, 
introducing  the  guests  to  their  pets,  while  Belmore 
with  perfect  boyishness  lent  himself  to  their 
frolics. 

"As  a  guest  of  a  millionaire,"  the  doctor  wrote 
in  his  diary  that  night,  "I  have  enjoyed  an  ex- 
hibition of  ease  of  travel  and  of  one-man  power 
which  would  lead  one  to  think  that  America  was 
an  oligarchy,  pure  and  simple.  However,  on  our 
arrival  at  the  station  of  the  town  where  Mr.  Bel- 
more  is  literally  overlord,  only  his  children  and  his 
servants  were  there  to  receive  him,  and  a  vast 
crowd  of  the  townspeople  had  gathered  for  adu- 
lation of  our  demagogue. 

"Yet  by  the  demagogue's  own  confession,  the 
millionaire  of  the  manor,  instead  of  devoting  him- 

180 


The  Love  of  the  People 

self  to  a  life  of  pleasure,  works  hard  and  gives 
bountifully.  The  library,  the  hospital,  and  the 
park  we  passed  are  all  given  and  maintained  by 
him.  Possibly  the  millionaires  of  other  manors 
do  as  much,  and  these  benefits  are  taken  for 
granted  and  the  very  possession  of  the  power  of 
giving  is  resented.  Possibly  the  millionaires  of 
other  manors  give  nothing  at  all  and  our  host  is 
an  exception.  As  I  have  often  told  you,  little 
book,  the  world  is  peopled  by  individuals  and  ac- 
tors understand  the  claque  best.  Far  be  it  from 
me  to  form  any  conclusions  from  the  impressions 
of  this  wonderful  day,  which  Lucie  says  is  like  a 
journey  on  a  comet  in  a  new  universe.  Sufficient 
it  is  for  to-night  to  be  in  this  charming  home  where 
taste,  composure  and  self-restraint  reign." 


181 


XVIII 

TWO  STRONG  MEN  MEET 

THE  politician  had  not  renewed  the  gilt  letters 
which  the  rains  of  ten  years  had  washed  off 
the  swinging  sign  of  attorney-at-law  in  front  of  his 
office.  His  rooms  were  the  same  that  he  had  taken 
when,  his  education  finished,  he  sought  primaries 
instead  of  clients.  One  of  the  three  he  called  his 
shop ;  the  other  two  were  living-rooms,  plainly  fur- 
nished and  walled  with  books.  Jim,  the  negro 
man-servant  who  looked  after  them,  cooked  his 
breakfast,  while  he  ate  his  dinner  and  supper  at 
the  hotel  across  the  street. 

Men  who  hated  Kennan  because  they  had  served 
him  without  reward,  men  who  despised  him  on 
principle,  young  politicians  who  had  not  won  his 
favour,  old  politicians  who  were  the  relics  of  the 
regime  of  the  boss  whom  Kennan  had  supplanted, 
were  either  awaiting  Frane's  arrival  at  Kearn's 
Ford  or  appeared  in  a  day  or  two.  Some  of  these 
wanted  solely  to  fight  in  the  name  of  the  good 
cause;  others  wanted  to  enlist  under  any  party 
leader  who  would  break  a  lance  with  Kennan,  or 

182 


Two  Strong  Men  Meet 

fancied  themselves  prophets  who  had  chosen  the 
coming  man. 

John  knew  these  gentlemen  clearly,  sympathet- 
ically and  practically.  He  believed  in  them  far 
more  than  many  who  scoffed  at  them.  When  he 
gripped  their  hands  in  earnest  gratitude  for  their 
support  he  carried  them  to  high  ground,  where  it 
was  out  of  the  question  to  ask  him  to  make 
promises. 

"No  strings!"  he  said. 

His  phrase  had  taken  popular  fancy.  Already 
he  was  known  as  the  No-Strings  candidate.  Mine 
host  Binns,  who  had  said  in  the  address  of  wel- 
come from  the  hotel  veranda,  "It's  no  strings, 
John,  and  I've  lived  across  the  street  from  you  for 
ten  years,  and  we  know  you  aren't  stringin'  us 
when  you  say  it,"  was  surprised  to  find  himself 
famous.  "I'm  no  orator.  I  didn't  try  to  make 
a  speech,"  he  explained.  "I  just  said  what  I 
felt." 

"Which  is  the  best  kind  of  speech  and  the  only 
true  oratory,"  John  told  him. 

From  the  newspapers  and  from  those  wireless 
messages  which  pass  over  the  current  of  common 
thought  as  well,  John  heard  the  call  of  the  people. 
But  he  must  be  nominated  before  they  could  vote 
for  him,  and  Frank  Kennan  would  control  the 
convention. 

183 


Lucy  of  the  Stars 

On  the  third  day  another  emissary  came  from 
the  Boss,  a  man  of  different  type  from  the  one 
who  had  been  sent  to  the  pier.  The  first  had  been 
oily,  well  dressed,  and  a  polished  talker  according  to 
his  own  conception.  As  one  of  the  tools  used  as  a 
go-between  with  the  "vested  interests,"  Kennan  had 
thought  that  he  was  fitted  to  approach  a  man  of 
Frane's  type.  Plainly,  Kennan  had  recognised  his 
mistake,  for  the  second,  Bill  Dunham,  in  a  derby 
hat,  sack  coat,  and  chewing  a  half-smoked  cigar, 
was  known  for  his  bluntness. 

"The  old  man  thinks  a  good  deal  of  you,"  he 
said.  "That's  the  straight  goods.  He  wants  to 
run  you  all  right,  and  he  don't  want  to  tie  you  up 
with  promises,  either.  He  knows  a  machine  can- 
didate can't  win  this  year.  But  it's  kind  of  habit 
with  the  old  man  to  have  the  people  come  to  him, 
and  habits  is  hard  to  break.  Well,  he  wants  to 
see  you,  all  right,  and  be  on  the  square  with  you, 
and  why  can't  you  and  him  go  down  to  the  capital 
and  meet  there  by  accident  day  after  to-morrow?" 

"But  we  would  not  be  meeting  by  accident," 
said  John,  quietly. 

"Well,  I'm !     Of  all  the !"     Dunham 

rose  and  brought  his  fist  down  on  the  table.  "I'll 
tell  you  right  here  that's  a  hell  of  a  sight  more'n 
he  ever  did  for  the  present  governor.  The  old 
man  don't  often  get  soft,  and  he's  been  a  little  soft 

184 


Two  Strong  Men  Meet 

about  you;  but  I  guess  if  you  meet  him  now 
it'll  be  by  accident,  all  right.  Good  morning  to 
you." 

Frane,  instead  of  striking  the  attitude  of  the 
good  young  man,  gripped  Dunham's  hand  vigor- 
ously, and  vigorous  were  his  words  and  as  honest 
as  his  blue  eyes. 

"You  tell  the  boss  for  me,"  he  said,  "that  I'm 
glad  he  sent  you  this  time.  I  like  to  deal  with  a 
man  that  has  a  square  jaw  and  talks  and  looks 
straight  at  you.  We  can  understand  each  other, 
you  and  I,  and  I  am  glad  to  have  met  you.  You 
tell  the  boss  for  me  that  I  am  going  right  on  fight- 
ing— in  the  open — fighting  to  make  the  party 
better." 

As  Dunham  went  he  said  to  himself: 

"He's  on  the  level,  all  right,  if  he  is  a  little 
buggy.     I  like  the  kid." 

Many  visitors  had  gone  down  those  creaking 
stairs  past  the  letterless  sign  with  the  same  thought 
in  mind.  Instead  of  saying  "buggy"  some  had 
said  eccentric,  some  blunt,  some  extraordinary. 

Frane  thrust  his  hands  deep  in  his  pockets  and 
took  a  turn  about  the  room  with  ambition  mock- 
ing his  decision.  For  saying  the  word  to  Dunham 
he  might  be  governor,  and  have  the  power  to  carry 
out  some  of  those  policies  which  were  the  outcome 
in  mature  experience  of  his  youthful  dreams. 

185 ' 


Lucy  of  the  Stars 


"No,"  he  thought,  "I  will  be  square  with  the 
boss  and  the  party,  as  I  have  been  with  the  people. 
He  must  know  that  I  am  not  his  man.  And — 
and,  maybe,  he  will  come  around,  after  all."  At 
which  the  politician  whistled  delightedly. 

Repeating  his  conversation  with  Frane  word  for 
word  to  his  master,  Dunham  added  no  comment 
of  his  own,  except  that  if  the  "old  man"  and  "the 
kid"  ever  did  meet  it  would  be  worth  a  year  of  his 
own  life  to  hear  the  "spiel  between  them."  Ken- 
nan  thought  for  a  while,  and  then  announced  that 
he  was  going  to  Kearn's  Ford.  When  the  phe- 
nomenal event  of  the  great  boss's  entrance  into 
the  law  office  of  the  No-Strings  candidate  occurred 
next  morning,  Bill  Dunham,  elate  over  the  coming 
entertainment,  was  with  him.  Kennan  gave  his 
hand  to  the  young  man  offishly.  John  gripped  it 
warmly. 

"You're  the  man  I've  wanted  to  know  better  for 
years,  Mr.  Kennan,"  John  said.  "Dunham  and 
I  have  already  hit  it  off,  and  I  wonder  if  you  and 
I  can." 

Kennan  was  fifty-five,  with  a  close-cropped 
beard,  heavy  eyebrows,  a  fighting  nose,  and  a 
clear,  gray  eye.  For  ten  years  he  had  been  boss 
of  the  city,  and  for  the  last  five  boss  of  the  State. 
A  lock  of  white  hair  which  hung  over  the  centre 
of  his  forehead  had  become  the  famous  horn  of 

186 


Two  Strong  Men  Meet 

the  cartoonists.  In  public  prints  he  was  a  mon- 
ster; in  actual  appearance  he  was  quiet  and 
well-groomed.  Although  he  had  risen  from  the 
streets,  he  had  a  self-restraint  which  would  have 
carried  him  anywhere  among  men.  He  was  shy 
only  of  women,  as  he  himself  said. 

"I  came  because  I  liked  your  nerve,"  he  stated, 
as  he  sat  down.  "Understand,  I  am  asking  for 
no  promises.  You  have  always  fought  me.  You 
can  have  a  man  of  your  own  here  or  Bill  can  go 
out,  as  you  please.,' 

"I  want  Bill  to  stay  and  I  don't  want  anybody 
else,"  John  replied  promptly.  "I  know  you  are  a 
man  of  your  word,  Mr.  Kennan." 

The  boss  narrowed  his  eyebrows  in  surprise. 

"I  thought  that  you  thought  I  was  a  liar  and 
a  thief,"  he  half  growled. 

"I  think  you  keep  your  word,  and  that's  why 
you  have  succeeded  in  holding  men  to  you.  But 
I  also  think  that  you  have  made  the  party  serve 
you  in  making  a  fortune." 

"I  haven't  been  in  politics  altogether  for  pleas- 
ure and  I'm  not  a  liar,"  he  said.  "To  come  to 
cases,  what  are  you  going  to  do  for  the  party  if 
you  are  nominated  and  elected?" 

"I'm  going  to  be  loyal  to  the  party  as  I  see  its 
interests,  as  I  have  always  been.  I  am  going  to 
consult  you.     You  know  public  life,   and  public 

187 


Lucy  of  the  Stars 

life  is  a  service  by  itself.  You  know,  as  an  expert 
judge  of  men,  who  can  give  the  cleanest  and  most 
efficient  service  in  any  office.  Will  you  agree  in 
your  recommendations  to  follow  this  principle, 
regardless  of  profit  to  yourself  or  to  personal 
affiliations?  If  you  deceive  me  I  shall  use  the 
power  of  my  office  to  overthrow  you." 

A  new  proposition  this  to  the  boss,  to  whom 
every  appointment  had  been  a  part  of  the  political 
game.  It  was  no  surprise  to  Dunham,  who  was 
used  to  these  heavy  silences  which  decided  the  fate 
of  men  and  measures,  that  his  master  waited  a 
minute  before  making  his  answer. 

"I  agree,"  said  Kennan  finally.  For  he  knew 
he  could  win  only  with  Frane  as  a  candidate. 
"Now,  what  about  money?"  he  said,  rising.  "Will 
that  friend  of  yours  up  on  the  hill,  Belmore,  put 
up  anything?" 

"I  wouldn't  ask  him.  We  are  friends  but  not 
associates." 

"And  I  won't  ask  him  myself,"  said  the  boss. 
"Bill  here  says  that  if  Belmore  ever  gave  anybody 
a  bouquet  it  was  in  a  block  of  ice.  When  I  told 
him  last  campaign  that  if  he  didn't  put  up  some- 
thing we  would  block  the  new  East  End  tunnel, 
he  said  that  I'd  have  to  promise  him  that  I  wouldn't 
block  it  or  he  and  his  crowd  would  put  up  five  hun- 
dred thousand  to  beat  me ;  and  I  had  to  side-step. 

188 


Two  Strong  Men  Meet 

I  guess  we  won't  need  much  money.  It's  not  a 
money  campaign.  The  hurrah  will  carry  us 
through,  all  right." 

"Yes,  that's  it;  that  is  better  than  money.  I 
have  never  used  much  money,  Mr.  Kennan.  I 
have  told  the  people  what  I  wanted  to  do,  and 
I've  tried  to  keep  my  promises." 

"Oh,  I've  watched  you,"  said  the  boss,  sharply. 
"You  got  among  the  people  young,  like  I  did,  and 
worked  with  them.  You're  a  good  deal  like  my 
brother,  the  priest.  You're  workin'  up  politics  the 
way  he  does  religion,  on  a  no-profit  basis." 

"The  priesthood  of  public  service  I  sometimes 
call  it,"  said  John,  smiling.  "We  hope  to  enlist 
you,  Mr.  Kennan.  We'll  rush  you  right  up  to  the 
thirty-third  degree,  if  you'll  join." 

The  boss  laughed  for  the  first  time  during  the 
interview. 

"I've  made  some  money,  I  admit,"  he  said,  "and 
I  guess  I'm  as  much  entitled  to  it  as  some  of  the 
millionaires  and  the  coal  gang  with  their  holier 
than  thou.  I  have  made  them  give  up,  and  a  good 
deal  that  they've  given  up  has  gone  back  to  the 
folks  in  the  tenements.  That's  how  I  keep  my 
power.  You'll  find  you  can't  run  anything  with- 
out leadership  and  organisation.  Nine  out  of  ten 
men  are  looking  for  some  one  to  follow.  I  found 
that  out  at  the  start  down  in  the  ward.     I  under- 

189 


Lucy  of  the  Stars 

stand  why  you  like  to  work  for  the  people.  My 
brother's  happier'n  I  am.  I  never  was  so  happy 
as  when  I  began  my  politics  in  the  ward  and  got 
the  votes  direct,  before  I  got  high  enough  to  have 
other  people  get  them  for  me." 

"The  point  is  where  you  lead  the  people,"  said 
John.  "The  thing  is  to  be  true  to  them.  When 
you  create  a  political  machine  to  be  sold  to  mil- 
lionaires you're  going  the  wrong  way  about  it. 
But  I'll  not  preach  now.  You've  given  me  the 
agreement  I  wanted." 

"Yes,  and  I  keep  my  word  and  you  spiel,"  said 
the  boss.  "You  can't  talk  to  'em  too  much.  They 
like  to  hear  you  and  they  believe  all  you  say.  The 
place  to  hold  your  ratification  meetin'  is  right  here 
in  this  town,  where  every  man,  woman,  and  child 
seems  to  be  for  you.  They  were  that  way  for  me 
once  in  my  ward.  Have  a  big  delegation  at  the 
convention  and  let  'em  yell  so  the  whole  State'll 
hear  'em." 

There  was  yet  one  thing  to  be  settled,  they  re- 
called, when  the  boss's  hand  was  on  the  door-knob. 
At  the  hotel  across  the  street  the  newspaper  men 
were  waiting  to  convey  the  result  of  this  confer- 
ence to  the  six  million  readers  of  the  State. 

"I'll  give  'em  the  hint  that  the  party's  for  you, 
I'm  on  the  band-waggon,  and  you're  not  bound," 
said  Kennan. 

190 


Two  Strong  Men   Meet 

"No,  tell  them  we  have  made  a  deal  and  just 
what  it  is,"  said  John. 

"  What !"  exclaimed  Kennan.     "A  deal !" 

"Yes.  Take  the  people  quite  into  our  con- 
fidence. I  am  willing  that  the  public  should  know 
every  word  that  has  passed  between  us." 

The  boss  smiled  and  patted  John  almost  affec- 
tionately on  the  shoulder.  John  was  satisfied  for 
the  present  to  let  him  have  his  way. 

"Leave  it  to  me,  Governor,"  he  said.  "I'm  the 
one  that's  made  the  kowtow." 

"Good  day,  Governor,"  Dunham  added. 

Governor !  The  directing  head  of  a  great  com- 
monwealth, with  no  strings!  With  this  elation 
came  the  thought  which  always  comes  at  such 
times,  the  thought  of  the  one  to  whom  he  wanted 
first  to  tell  the  news.  He  had  barely  finished  a 
telegram  to  Geraldine  when  further  consideration 
chilled  his  enthusiasm.  This  was  an  act,  he  told 
himself,  which  was  only  carrying  him  further  in 
an  illusion  which  might  cause  her  pain  and  grief 
as  well  as  himself.  The  luxury  in  which  she  had 
been  reared  had  become  a  necessity  to  her.  Al- 
ready he  had  eaten  into  the  principal  of  his  own 
little  fortune,  and  he  foresaw  the  day  when  it  would 
be  finished  and  he  must  give  up  politics  or  else  sac- 
rifice that  independence  which  made  his  political 
work   valuable.      Her   mother,    he   knew,   would 

191 


Lucy  of  the  Stars 

never  consent  to  their  marriage.  The  world  would 
say  that  money  was  his  object.  Geraldine's  con- 
straint of  late  had  prepared  him  for  her  vexation 
and  surprise  should  he  ever  suggest  himself  as 
other  than  a  chum.  If  he  would  keep  her  friend- 
ship he  must  keep  his  secret. 

"Besides,"  he  thought,  "this  news  would  mean 
no  more  in  Geraldine's  world  than  the  announce- 
ment of  fresh  discoveries  in  the  excavation  of 
ancient  Babylon." 

As  the  bits  of  the  message  fell  into  the  waste- 
basket  it  seemed  that  all  the  personal  happiness 
which  the  nomination  meant  to  him  fluttered  away 
with  them.     Then  he  dropped  a  line  to  Belmore. 

"The  boss  is  for  me  without  my  having  to  forfeit 
my  independence.  So  I'll  be  nominated.  Tell 
Fanny  and  the  little  German  girl,  too,  for  this 
Alice  has  been  most  interested  in  the  wonderland 
of  our  politics." 


192 


XIX 


A  DINNER  AT  BENDER'S 


ONE  may  boast  neither  in  love  nor  in  diplo- 
macy, and  when  the  two  are  mixed  one 
must  keep  even  his  smiles  to  himself.  The  ser- 
vices to  his  country  of  His  Britannic  Majesty's 
Ambassador  to  the  United  States  were  not  limited 
to  official  routine.  Lord  Bromley's  manner  was 
so  grave  that  only  those  who  knew  him  intimately 
appreciated  the  versatility  of  his  mind  and  his 
quiet  sense  of  humour.  On  the  score  that  you 
may  judge  performance  only  by  the  difficulty  of  the 
task  performed,  he  would  have  been  the  last  to 
assume  any  credit  as  a  commercial  agent  for  his 
country. 

"In  England,"  he  once  said,  in  a  burst  of  con- 
fidence, "we  have  thousands  of  fine  young  fellows 
who  are  attractive  companions  in  every  way,  and 
many  of  whom  might  be  of  service  to  the  State, 
only  they  have  the  misfortune  to  have  no  money. 
American  men  are  too  busy  to  entertain  their 
women,  or  even  to  be  entertained;  but,  rather, 
they  worship  their  women  by  a  kind  of  absent 

193 


Lucy  of  the  Stars 

treatment,  buying  them  fine  plumage  and  exhibit- 
ing them  as  the  spoil  of  financial  war,  and  then 
escaping  to  business.  The  daughter  wants  a  dia- 
mond necklace;  father  buys  one.  The  daughter 
wants  a  nobleman;  father  buys  one." 

Without  ever  alluding  to  it  in  that  way,  he  was 
so  sure  that  a  rich  marriage  was  the  real  object  of 
Carniston's  visit  that  he  laid  out  a  campaign 
accordingly,  opening  the  right  avenues  and  inform- 
ing him,  in  intelligent  asides,  of  the  status  of  each 
girl  whom  he  met.  Mrs.  Hodges,  he  remarked, 
was  a  trial,  although  Miss  Hodges  was  so  beauti- 
ful and  charming  that  you  overlooked  the  in- 
cubus. "Besides,  it's  my  opinion,  not  generally 
shared,  I  own,  that  the  young  lady  is  deeper  than 
she  seems ;  a  little  perplexing  and  difficult,  I  should 
say" — which  was  the  acme  of  a  hint  to  one  who 
would  not  waste  time  on  a  golden  quest. 

Among  the  invitations  to  dinner  that  Carniston 
received  was  one  from  Bender.  When  the  earl 
mentioned  this  to  his  social  mentor,  the  ambassa- 
dor's eyes  twinkled,  without  any  change,  however, 
in  his  frock-coat  manner  or  his  rather  heavy 
countenance.  Bromley  was  a  product  of  merit 
who  had  only  recently  come  into  his  peerage,  and 
it  was  his  Anglo-Saxon  directness  of  method  and 
his  real  liking  for  the  country,  despite  what  he 
would  call  his  clear  conception  of  its  foibles — 

194 


A   Dinner  at  Bender's 

the  eternal  reservations  of  one  whose  mind  is  a 
looking-glass  of  many  capitals — which  had  made 
him  the  most  popular  British  diplomatist  ever 
sent  to  America.  His  experience  of  the  world 
had  taught  him  that  a  man  who  is  a  little  pagan 
in  his  loyalty  to  his  own  breed  is  the  best  man. 
His  private  contempt  for  Bender  was  enormous. 

"I  think  you'll  find  it  worth  while  for  once," 
he  said.  "I  shall  be  interested  to  learn  your  im- 
pressions. You  will  meet  only  foreigners  there — 
of  course,  I  don't  regard  Americans  as  foreigners." 

As  a  careful  student  of  manners,  Bender  had 
achieved  a  position  in  Washington  which  was  a 
commanding  one  of  its  kind.  The  eldest  of  his 
three  daughters  was  married  to  a  baronet  in  the 
diplomatic  service — but  the  son  of  a  peer,  as  Ben- 
der always  told  you;  the  second,  to  a  German 
baron;  and  the  third,  to  a  French  count.  His  only 
son  flitted  from  place  to  place  abroad.  Reginald 
was  delightfully  free  from  responsibility,  the 
family  fortune  being  in  real  estate  which  his  grand- 
father, the  hatter,  had  bought  before  Washington 
had  become  a  great  residential  city.  In  parentheses 
he  was  always  mentioning  the  fact  that  his  three 
sisters  were  titled;  and  he  was  convinced  that 
America  was  no  place  for  a  gentleman  to  live. 

"The  poor  boy,"  said  a  witty  American  cabinet 
officer,  "is  most  unfortunate  in  his  sex.     It  keeps 

195 


Lucy  of  the  Stars 

him  always  in  the  corridor  explaining  that  he  knows 
the  people  in  the  boxes." 

The  dinner  which  Carniston  attended  was  given 
in  honour  of  Prince  Galitzini's  engagement  to  Miss 
Warwark,  whose  father  had  accumulated  a  fortune 
in  little  more  than  the  stipulated  minute  which  was 
the  time  advertised  to  cook  the  breakfast  food  he 
manufactured  out  of  bran.  Warwark  had  shown 
his  future  son-in-law  over  the  plant  to  the  last  de- 
tail in  proof  of  his  financial  stability  and  position, 
while  Galitzini  had  carried  away  only  one  definite 
impression. 

"The  little  girls  who  filled  the  packets  were  not 
like  our  healthy  Italians,  who  live  on  simple  food. 
They  were  so  pale.  For  lunch  they  ate  candy  and 
oranges,  and  on  four  dollars  a  week  they  dress  so 
chic.     Wonderful,  wonderful!" 

Mrs.  and  Miss  Warwark  had  long  ago  deserted 
the  little  Western  town  where  the  father  had  made 
his  fortune ;  and  Warwark,  giving  back  nothing  to 
the  land  in  bequests  or  in  personal  attention,  took 
no  more  sentimental  interest  in  his  home  town  than 
if  it  were  the  interior  of  a  coal  mine.  Returning 
on  the  train,  the  prince  had  outlined  happily  once 
more  the  plans  for  the  reparation  of  his  own  estate 
in  his  dear  Italy. 

Besides  the  earl  and  the  prince,  the  others  at 
Bender's  dinner  were  Geoffrey  Calkins,  a  British 

196 


A  Dinner  at  Bender's 

officer,  who  was  also  living  at  the  embassy;  Count 
von  Vorburg,  of  Prussia;  Prince  Morloff,  of 
Russia ;  and  four  young  Continental  attaches.  Be- 
fore he  was  through  with  the  entree  Carniston  felt 
as  bored  as  if  he  were  shopping  for  ribbons.  Be- 
fore he  reached  the  coffee  he  was  positively  under- 
going punishment.  He  had  that  insularity  which 
is  not  without  virtue  in  our  cousins.  To  be  a 
Briton,  he  thought,  was  to  have  an  advantage  over 
a  foreigner  in  that  he  was  a  Briton  in  quite  the 
same  way  that  John  Frane,  another  man  who  was 
true  to  the  breed  and  the  land,  thought  of  himself 
first  as  an  American. 

Some  of  the  attaches  had  been  watching  their 
opportunities  for  a  year  and  more  without  finding 
acceptance  in  a  quarter  where  the  finances  were  in 
keeping  with  their  ambitions  or  the  personal  sacri- 
fice to  surroundings  was  not  too  great.  The 
weather-beaten  Calkins  was  in  striking  racial  con- 
trast to  them.  Carniston  found  himself  cynically 
computing  how  long  it  would  take  Calkins  to 
throw  the  lot  of  them  out  of  the  window,  and 
imagining  how,  in  any  crisis  where  men  returned 
to  primitive  conditions,  Calkins,  from  sheer  male 
superiority,  would  take  instant  command  of  the 
others. 

After  the  dinner  he  and  Calkins  walked  back  to 
the  embassy  together.    Calkins  had  won  the  Victoria 

197 


Lucy  of  the  Stars 

Cross  about  the  same  time  that  the  girl  he  loved 
married  a  man  who  was  not  poor  and  his  brother, 
the  head  of  the  family,  died  leaving  a  bankrupt 
estate  and  heavy  responsibilities  to  the  younger 
son,  whose  whole  life  had  been  spent  in  India. 

"I  saw  the  beggars  there  and  rode  through 
them;  and  when  I  saw  Phipps  left  behind,  I  had 
to  go  back  after  him,  and  he  called  me  a  bally  ass 
for  my  trouble,"  he  said  when  anybody  tried  to 
make  a  hero  of  him.  "I  think  he'd  rather  have 
stayed.  What  was  the  use  of  living  to  him  with 
his  polo  arm  gone  ?  I've  apologised  to  him  since, 
and  told  him  I  had  to  save  him  because  it  was  in 
the  game." 

He  was  so  mortally  cold  and  matter-of-fact 
about  the  object  that  had  brought  him  to  Wash- 
ington, and  the  scar  on  his  cheek  made  him  look 
so  savage  when  he  smiled,  that  His  Excellency  was 
a   little   worried   lest  he   should   fail    altogether. 

"It's  a  rotten  business,  this,"  said  the  soldier, 
with  British  candour.  "If  it  wasn't  for  the  family 
I'd  chuck  it  and  find  some  billet  in  India.  But 
what  can  I  do?    I — I  can't  make  money." 

Yet  the  way  for  Calkins  seemed  clearer  than 
the  way  for  himself,  Carniston  thought;  for  the 
girl  that  Calkins  loved  was  dead.  Lucy  was  living 
— living  in  that  world  to  which  he  had  become  a 
stranger.       His  four  weeks  in  Washington  had 

198 


A  Dinner  at  Bender's 

shown  him  the  inside  of  the  life  of  those  people 
who  come  to  the  capital  to  get  into  society,  and 
from  whose  ranks  are  recruited  many  "hearts  that 
fly  abroad."  The  sycophancy  shown  to  his  title — 
that  title  whose  existence  was  gall  to  him — and  the 
feeble  efforts  to  prove  an  ancestry  as  a  mark  for 
his  approval,  when  ancestry  meant  to  him  the  in- 
heritance of  a  grim  duty,  were  more  depressing 
than  amusing. 

There  was  a  real  America,  he  knew,  which  lay 
beyond.  He  had  glimpses  of  it  in  Washington, 
and  he  had  felt  its  abstraction  with  its  own  great 
affairs,  its  indifference  to  foreign  forms,  and  its  self- 
respect — the  America  which  His  Britannic  Maj- 
esty's Ambassador  heartily  admired. 

Belmore  belonged  to  it,  and  Frane;  and  they 
and  the  others  whom  he  liked  were  equally 
alien  to  the  ground  of  the  wife-hunters'  brigade. 
He  associated  Geraldine  with  the  Belmores,  and 
she,  too,  had  these  qualities.  He  was  not  averse, 
after  the  dinners  he  had  suffered,  to  dining  the  next 
night  en  famille  with  Mrs.  Hodges  and  Geraldine. 
It  was  not  intentional,  let  alone  malicious,  on  his 
part  that  Mrs.  Hodges  drank  a  deal  of  champagne. 

His  attentiveness  was  probably  responsible  for 
her  forgetting  herself;  and  in  such  moments  of  ob- 
livion, when  formality  no  longer  pressed  on  her 
being  as  her  corsets  pressed  on  her  avoirdupois, 

199 


Lucy  of  the  Stars 

she  was  again  the  woman  who  had  once  cooked  for 
her  energetic  young  husband  and  gloried  in  his 
achievements — as  she  continued  to  do  until  snubs 
from  the  heights  and  overfeeding  and  his  inadap- 
tability to  social  usages  led  her  to  envelop  him  in 
an  atmosphere  of  complaint.  He  had  loved  Hat- 
tie  in  his  way,  and  the  more  money  he  had  made 
for  her,  the  less  she  had  been  the  Hattie  that  he 
had  married.  If  he  could  have  heard  the  praise 
she  now  bestowed  on  this  giant — from  whom  Ger- 
aldine  had  inherited  her  physique  and  a  natural 
dignity  which  education  had  refined — he  might 
have  found  some  of  the  happiness  in  his  success 
which  it  had  failed  to  bring.  She  told  of  their  rise, 
step  by  step,  as  the  earl  drew  her  out,  till  finally 
she  struck  the  table  and  exclaimed  in  her  enthu- 
siasm : 

"Jim  Hodges  was  a  great  man !" 

Then  suddenly  she  could  feel  the  streams  of 
perspiration  down  her  bodice  and  her  face  seemed 
to  be  held  to  a  furnace  door.  She  wanted  to  sink 
under  the  floor. 

Throughout  her  recital  Geraldine  had  smiled, 
and  her  smile  was  ever  the  same.  Not  once,  by 
glance  or  word,  had  she  endeavoured  to  suppress 
the  maternal  digression. 

"Masterful  and  creative,"  said  the  earl,  "and 
your  choice  of  him  and  his  choice  of  you  were  a 

200 


A  Dinner  at  Bender's 

splendid  tribute  to  you.  I  do  not  wonder  that  you 
speak  of  him  with  pride.  He  recalls  the  founder 
of  our  house,  and  more  particularly  another  of  my 
ancestors  whom  we  call  the  hunter.  Yes,  I  think 
they  were  very  like." 

It  is  a  strange  world,  Hattie  Hodges!  Here 
you  have  been  for  twenty  years  trying  to  impress 
your  gentility  upon  others  by  being  untrue  to  your- 
self, and  here  you  are  true  to  yourself  and  you  de- 
light the  "scion  of  a  noble  family,"  as  the  novels 
which  you  began  reading  in  the  first  stage  of  pros- 
perity would  have  called  Carniston. 

While  the  mother  was  tongue-tied,  Geraldine 
deftly  took  up  the  conversation  and  carried  it  eas- 
ily away  to  other  topics  with  the  help  of  her  smile. 
If  she  had  frowned  or  had  exclaimed  "Mother!" 
in  a  pet,  to  stop  the  flow  of  the  narrative,  Car- 
niston would  have  had  a  different  estimate  of  the 
daughter.  Now  he  found  himself  liking  her. 
With  her  beauty  there  was  a  self-restraint  and  an 
absence  of  pretence  that  charmed  him. 


201 


XX 

CASTLES  AND  A  GOTHIC  GIRL 

THEY  were  speaking  of  Geraldine  when  Lucy 
happened  to  look  out  of  the  window  at  the 
pile  on  a  neighbouring  hill  in  which  Jim  Hodges 
had  apparently  aimed  to  combine  all  the  architec- 
tural types.  Fanny  suddenly  made  a  grimace  and 
put  her  hands  over  Lucy's  eyes. 

"Don't  blame  Geraldine  for  that!"  she  said. 

"Why  should  I  ?  Geraldine  has  to  bear  it.  I'm 
sorry  for  her." 

"And  you  a  stranger!"  exclaimed  Fanny,  mar- 
velling. "I've  flattered  myself  that  I  was  the  only 
one  who  understood  Geraldine.  Now  I  begin  to 
think  that  you  understand  her  a  little." 

"I  believe  I  do,"  Lucy  rejoined;  for,  to  tell  the 
truth,  she  had  made  Geraldine  a  study.  She  had 
a  presentiment  that  her  fate  was  in  some  way 
bound  up  with  Geraldine's,  and  her  attitude  toward 
the  girl  whom  she  already  considered  in  one  sense  a 
rival  was  one  of  mixed  curiosity  and  sympathy. 

Lucy  had  never  been  more  lovable  or  more 
thoughtful  than   during  the  last  ten  days.      She 

202 


Castles  and  a  Gothic  Girl 

romped  with  the  children;  she  quizzed  them  in 
French ;  she  told  them  stories  new  to  childish  an- 
nals, for  invention  was  more  preoccupying  than 
the  narration  of  the  old-timers.  They  helped  her 
to  keep  among  the  stars,  away  from  the  earth 
where  the  ghosts  were.  With  her  hostess  she 
had  formed  one  of  those  deep,  sweet  friendships 
which  may  spring  up  in  a  week  when  natures 
are  rhythmic.  Lindley  called  her  cousin,  and  in 
his  gratitude  for  her  presence  his  discussion  of 
plans  with  Dr.  von  Kar  reduced  itself  to  prompt 
consent  to  all  the  doctor's  suggestions  for  the 
new  factory. 

Every  time  they  had  a  word  in  private  her  hus- 
band teased  Fanny  about  woman's  infallible  intu- 
itions as  demonstrated  by  her  conclusion  that  there 
was  an  attachment  between  Lucy  and  the  earl. 
What  he  overlooked  and  what  Fanny,  almost  con- 
vinced of  her  error,  overlooked  was  the  essential 
truth  that  such  sparks  as  she  saw  when  Lucy  sang 
the  never-care  song  aboard  the  steamer  could  come 
only  when  the  two  lovers  were  together. 

Fanny  was  forever  leading  Lucy  to  talk  of  Car- 
niston,  and  even  such  a  clever  woman  as  she  was 
could  be  deceived  by  such  a  supremely  clever  girl 
as  Lucy  von  Kar.  In  the  moments  of  play-acting, 
when  he  was  the  subject  of  conversation,  she 
who  wept  over  him  at  night  would  express  her 

203 


Lucy  of  the  Stars 

conviction   that    Carniston   and   Geraldine   would 
make  a  most  delightful  match. 

"It  so  seldom  happens  that  way!"  she  said.  "I 
know  so  many  tall  men  who  are  married  to  short 
women,  so  many  stupid  men  who  are  married  to 
clever  women,  and  stupid  women  who  are  married 
to  clever  men,  not  to  mention  handsome  women 
married  to  plain  men.  That  is  wrong.  Like 
should  wed  like.  Arthur  and  Geraldine  are  a 
match  fit  for  the  gods,  who,  sailing  in  a  stately  ship, 
should  find  life  a  summer  sea.  I  can  see  them 
riding  in  Hyde  Park  and  hear  cynical  people  ask- 
ing, 'How  did  that  happen  ?'  and  all  the  nurse- 
maids, who  are  true  idealists,  declaring  that  here  is 
a  pair  who  look  like  a  real  earl  and  countess." 

Geraldine  would  appear  so  thoroughly  at  home 
under  the  heads  of  the  beasts  at  the  Steadley  table, 
and  she  seemed  so  easy  to  marry  as  a  matter  of 
duty,  that  Solicitor  Wormley,  Lucy  thought,  must 
be  in  control  of  the  fate  that  sent  her  across  Car- 
niston's  path. 

"I  think  you  are  horrid!"  Fanny  cried;  uyou 
and  your  earl,  too — so  horrid  I've  a  mind  to  pinch 
you.  Geraldine  is  not  going  to  marry  him.  She  is 
going  to  marry  John." 

"The  politician !  What  would  she  do — be  bored 
by  his  speeches,  while  he  was  woful  because  they 
did  not  interest  her?" 

204 


Castles  and  a  Gothic  Girl 

"I  recant.  I  don't  believe  you  understand  her  a 
bit.  Tall  and  stately  fiddlesticks!  What  about 
the  hearts  in  the  tall  and  stately  bodies?  She  will 
look  at  him  sympathetically  and  bring  him  in- 
spiration and  steadiness.  They  were  born  for  each 
other.    She  will  marry  him;  you  will  see." 

"She  is  Gothic  herself  and  likes  cathedrals  and 
castles.  She  will  marry  the  earl;  you  will  see," 
persisted  Lucy. 

"And  you  will  see,"  said  Fanny,  crossly. 

She  thought  that  she  was  speaking  with  reason, 
as  she  had  a  note  from  Geraldine  asking:  "Isn't 
chums  a  little  too  honest  to  deal  with  the  Kennan 
monster?  Won't  he  fool  our  good  old  John  and 
lead  him  on  to  ruin  ?  Of  course  I  don't  know,  and 
you  mustn't  tell  chums  that  I  said  so.  He  will 
think  me  such  a  stupid — and  I  know  I  am." 

The  Belmores  had  followed  the  course  of  John's 
campaign  with  rare  heart  interest,  thinking  of  him 
as  their  hero  whose  preoccupation  was  making 
him  a  stranger  to  them.  He  had  been  at  the  house 
twice  to  a  hurried  luncheon,  and  then  he  had 
talked  more  to  Lucy  than  to  Lin  and  Fanny.  Lucy 
had  read  the  newspapers  diligently,  and  her  sym- 
pathy had  a  certain  intelligent  quickness  of  appre- 
ciation which  theirs  seemed  to  lack.  Through  her 
they  even  received  news  from  the  warrior  of  how 
the  battle  was  going;   for  he  had  dashed  off  a 

205 


Lucy  of  the  Stars 

note  to  "the  little  German  girl"  explaining  some 
things  which  he  feared  that  she  would  not  under- 
stand. 

It  was  three  or  four  mornings  after  John's 
nomination  that  Fanny  received  a  most  disturbing 
letter.  Mrs.  Hodges  rarely  wrote  to  Fanny,  and 
when  she  did  it  was  usually  through  her  social 
secretary.  This  time  the  handwriting  was  her  own, 
which  explained  the  grammar.  There  were  five 
pages  with  a  paltry  excuse  as  an  introduction  to 
the  subject  of  her  boasting,  "dear  Lord  Carnis- 
ton,"  as  she  called  him,  and  his  attentions  to  Ger- 
aldine,  which  were  already  so  pronounced  as  to 
amount  to  an  avowal.  As  Lucy  was  in  Phila- 
delphia with  her  father,  Fanny  could  not  share  the 
news  with  her,  and  she  had  to  restrain  her  vexa- 
tion until  Lindley  came  home  from  a  trip  to  Pitts- 
burg. 

"We've  done  a  good  deal  of  thinking  on  John's 
and  Geraldine's  account,"  he  said,  after  she  had 
read  him  the  letter,  "and  it's  time  we  found  out 
whether  we  are  wasting  our  pains  on  two  people 
who  may  have  quite  different  ideas  from  ours 
about  their  affairs." 

"But  how  find  out?"  she  asked,  wonderingly. 

"I  am  going  down  to  see  John,"  he  rejoined, 
"and  warn  him  that  if  he  wants  to  be  in  the  run- 
ning it's  time  he  moved." 

206 


Castles  and  a  Gothic  Girl 

"That's  very  rash,"  said  his  wife,  "but  it  might 
do — with  him.  Yes,  go — do  go !  I  want  to  hear 
what  he  will  say." 

She  walked  down  the  drive  with  Lindley  and 
begged  him  for  the  tenth  time,  as  he  turned  into 
the  road,  to  come  straight  back  with  the  news. 

In  the  first  half  hour  he  could  call  his  own  since 
seven  in  the  morning,  John  was  trying  to  outline 
the  points  of  the  speech  for  the  ratification  rally 
the  next  evening  at  the  Ford  Opera  House,  when 
Lindley  knocked  at  the  door.  After  a  siege  of 
conferences,  interviews,  and  vexations,  the  sight 
of  his  schoolmate  carried  him  back  to  days  when 
dreaming  was  as  good  as  doing  and  he  helped 
Lindley  on  the  classics  and  Lindley  helped  him  on 
mathematics. 

"On  the  ground  that  one  should  always  speak 
when  he  thinks  that  candour  will  be  of  service  to 
a  friend,  I  have  come  to  see  you  about  Geraldine, 
John.  This  earl  man,  as  you  call  him,  is  making 
love  to  her.  Fanny  has  a  letter  from  Mrs. 
Hodges,  who  is  promoting  the  affair,  and  Fanny 
and  I  agree  that  it  looks  serious." 

With  an  effort  at  a  smile  Frane  observed  that 
Carniston  must  consider  himself  a  lucky  fellow, 
and  that  the  world  would  wish  happiness  to  such 
a  handsome  couple. 

"But,  John,"  Lindley  pursued,  "Fanny  and  I 
207 


Lucy  of  the  Stars 

think  more  of  you  than  of  any  one  else  in  the 
world,  unless  it  is  Geraldine,  and " 

"Thanks  " — John  laid  his  hand  on  Lindley's 
arm,  and  Lindley  could  feel  the  hand  tremble — 
"I  don't  know  that  you  ever  said  it  in  so  many 
words  before.  It  means  a  deal  to  me  now  to  have 
it  in  that  way  from  the  two  beings  who  are  nearest 
to  me." 

"And  I  feel,"  Lindley  continued,  "that  I  can't 
go  back  and  report  to  Fanny  till  I  tell  you  that  it 
has  always  been  our  expectation  and  our  plan,  I 
might  say,  that  one  day  you  and  Geraldine  should 
be  married.  Though  we  don't  know  that  you  have 
ever  thought  of  her  in  that  light,  we  can't  stand 
by  and  see  this  outsider  paying  court  without  say- 
ing our  word." 

"It  was  my  dream,  too."  In  response,  John 
spoke  without  reserve.  "I  have  waited  for  her  as 
a  prince  waits  to  come  into  his  crown;  and  now 
that  she  has  reached  womanhood  I  often  find  my- 
self wishing  that  she  were  a  little  girl  again.  She 
has  changed — and  probably  I  have  changed, 
too. 

"Oh,  Lin,  I  thrashed  that  all  out  in  five  minutes 
of  hard  thinking  the  other  day,  and  the  castles 
came  down  with  a  crash.  You  see,  it  had  been  a 
fancy  that  I  should  like  to  take  her  as  a  bride  to 
the  governor's  house.     But  what  is  life  in  a  State 

208 


Castles  and  a  Gothic  Girl 

capital  to  a  girl  like  Geraldine  and  the  world  she 
has  chosen?  Although  I  was  happy  in  the  knowl- 
edge of  her  nearness  to  me,  would  she,  as  she  is 
now,  be  happy  with  the  people  she  met  there?  If 
I  had  been  climbing  the  ladder  of  wealth  instead 
of  politics,  why,  then,  perhaps  it  would  be  differ- 
ent. She  has  changed,  I  tell  you,  Lin,  more  even 
than  you  realise.  She  is  finding  her  place  and  her 
tastes.  Imagine  the  rage  of  her  mother  that  a 
governor  of  a  State,  who  mixes  with  assemblymen 
and  county  chairmen,  should  propose  for  the  hand 
for  which  an  earl  had  made  an  offer." 

"Mrs.  Hodges  is  an  aristocrat,  I  know,"  Lind- 
ley  put  in,  quietly,  "but  Geraldine,  perhaps,  would 
consider  an  American  governor  as  important  as  a 
British  earl." 

"Her  mother  would  say  that  I  wanted  Geral- 
dine's  money,"  John  continued.  "Doesn't  it  look 
as  if  I  did?  I  am  thirty-five  and  a  poor  devil  of  a 
politician ;  she  is  young  and  rich,  and  the  surround- 
ings of  wealth  have  become  the  necessities  of  life 
to  her.  Would  you  give  her  the  pain  of  having 
to  refuse  an  old  friend  toward  whom  I  hope  she 
still  feels  kindly?" 

"But  if  she  loved  you  and  would  marry  you 
regardless  of  money  and  everything?" 

"Then!"  John  sat  bolt  upright  and  drew  a 
deep  breath.     "How  calmly,  how  finely  she  could 

209 


Lucy  of  the  Stars 

do  it  if  she  would !  Oh,  I  haven't  forgotten  how 
she  looked  that  day  she  was  capsized  on  the  lake. 
But  heaven  is  in  the  clouds,  Lin,"  he  added  with 
a  wry  smile,  uand  they  say  that  no  American 
politician  goes  there — not  even  when  he  dies  and 
thus  becomes  a  statesman." 

"You  have  the  chance  of  giving  her  the  oppor- 
tunity. There  is  something  I  am  going  to  tell  you 
now  which  will  surprise  you  a  little.  You  know 
that  Jim  Hodges  was  a  man  of  primitive  passions 
and  ideas,  and  you  know  his  attitude  toward  you." 

Jim  Hodges  had  never  spoken  to  John  after 
their  interview  when  John,  home  from  the  univer- 
sity on  a  vacation,  with  his  own  peculiar  impetu- 
osity and  a  student's  cock-sureness,  had  outlined 
his  conception  of  one's  duty  to  his  fellow-man. 
Hodges'  eyebrows  sank  gradually  to  the  puffs 
under  his  eyes,  and  finally,  after  paying  his  respects 
to  the  cuspidor,  he  said : 

"I've  not  much  use  for  anarchists,  and  I  guess 
I've  not  much  use  for  you,  Mr.  Frane." 

"No,"  John  answered,  smiling,  and  with  a 
junior's  rudeness.  "Our  population  is  not  yet 
crowded,  and  we  must  not  forget  that  when  our 
forefathers  guaranteed  personal  liberty,"  and  he 
glanced  at  the  cuspidor,  "they  also  guaranteed 
intellectual  freedom." 

210 


Castles  and  a  Gothic  Girl 

Hodges  never  forgot  this  remark,  which  John 
regretted,  but  which  his  pride  would  not  let  him 
recall.  When  John  first  ran  for  the  legislature 
Hodges  spent  twenty-five  thousand  dollars  to  beat 
him ;  and  yet  more  voters  in  that  district  cast  their 
ballots  for  the  love  of  a  man  than  for  the  love  of 
money,  and  John  won ;  with  the  result  that,  in  view 
of  human  perversity  and  the  waywardness  of  the 
times,  Hodges  concluded  to  give  nothing  more  to 
charity. 

"Well,  John,  you  know  that  he  never  forgave 
you,"  Lindley  continued,  "and  while  his  first  will 
left  all  his  property  to  his  wife  under  my  direc- 
tion as  trustee,  a  second  will  provides  that  Geral- 
dine  shall  be  cut  off  with  a  small  allowance  if  she 
should  marry  you." 

John's  face  was  alight  instantly;  for  to  him 
money  was  made  to  feed  and  clothe  you,  and 
after  that  it  was  nothing,  and  affection  and  senti- 
ment and  the  mind-free  labours  of  chivalry  every- 
thing. 

"Then  I  can  go  to  her  and  ease  my  heart,  if  I 
will,"  he  said,  "and  offer  her  myself,  wanting  and 
expecting  nothing  except  herself."  With  the 
pencil  which  he  had  been  rolling  between  his  fingers 
he  began  covering  the  blotter  on  his  desk  with  in- 
choate   marks.      "Two    years    governor    and    no 

211 


Lucy  of  the  Stars 

man's  man!  Let  that  be  the  end  of  that  game! 
Then  I  would  play  another  entirely  for  her.  It 
is  a  thing  which  most  of  us  politicians  do  in  the 
end — make  money — which  we  have  to  do  when 
gray  hairs  remind  us  of  our  poverty."  The 
pencil  grew  more  active.  He  was  sketching  the 
clearing  and  the  cabin.  "Yes,  I  would  take  up 
my  profession.  I  would  work  for  her,  instead  of 
the  people.  That  is  the  greatest  tribute  that  I  can 
pay  to  any  woman." 

"Possibly  she  would  not  want  you  to  give  up 
politics,"  said  Lindley.  "Possibly  she  would  like 
to  work  with  you.  Are  you  so  sure  that  you  know 
her  ?  Fanny  thinks  the  constraint  which  she  shows 
toward  you  is  most  auspicious.  You,  not  she, 
must  ask  the  question  which  will  decide.  She  is 
in  the  hands  of  the  Philistines  now,  and  if  you 
have  anything  to  say  to  her  you  would  better  not 
wait." 

Frane,  in  his  way,  was  as  much  a  man  of  action 
as  Belmore,  only  his  acts  proceeded  from  what  his 
friends  called  right  impulses,  rather  than  from 
calculation. 

"Beginning  to-morrow  night,"  he  said,  "I  must 
speak  every  day  and  every  night  for  three  weeks. 
If  I  am  going  to  tell  her  this,  now  is  my  only  oppor- 
tunity. I  shall  take  the  12:30,  catch  the  night 
express  at  Philadelphia,  see  Geraldine  to-morrow 

212 


Castles  and  a  Gothic  Girl 

morning,  and  be  back  here  in  time  for  the  meeting 
to-morrow  night." 

Lindley  said  everything  to  harden  John's  reso- 
lution, and  remained  with  him  till  he  went  aboard 
the  train.  When  her  husband  burst  in  upon  Fanny 
triumphantly  and  told  her  of  Frane's  love  for 
Geraldine,  she  beamed;  but  when  he  told  her  of 
the  journey  to  Washington  and  proceeded  with 
his  story,  she  grew  serious. 

"You  goose !"  she  said.  "Do  I  pretend  to  un- 
derstand your  affairs — and  what  do  you  know 
about  affairs  like  this?  I  only  sent  you  for  infor- 
mation. I,  if  you  please,  intended  to  plan  the 
action  as  soon  as  I  knew  that  John  was  ready  to 
play  his  part.  Now  I  think  you've  quite  spoiled 
everything." 

"But  I  thought  that  was  rather  smart  for  me, 
inventing  the  story  that  Geraldine  would  be  cut 
off  without  a  penny  if  she  married  John,"  Lindley 
pleaded.  "It  rang  the  bell,  anyway,  and  it  seemed 
to  me  that  money  was  the  stumbling-block." 

"You  don't  suppose,  do  you,  that  Geraldine 
wants  to  go  to  him  when  she  brings  him  nothing!" 
Fanny  cried.  "She  wants  to  help  him.  Oh,  if  you 
understood  her,  you'd  understand!  I  suppose  he 
went  in  a  sack  suit  with  baggy  knees  and  threw  a 
collar  into  a  bag." 

Lindley  had  a  faint  recollection  of  seeing  Jim 
213 


Lucy  of  the  Stars 

put  something  into  a  suit-case,  and  so  remarked 
drily. 

"How  long  will  he  have  in  Washington?" 
Fanny  demanded  in  vexation. 

"He  arrives  at  seven  and  has  to  leave  at  ten, 
I  think,  in  order  to  make  connections." 

"I  suppose  he'll  set  the  suit-case  in  the  hall,  and 
while  he  waits  for  her  in  the  drawing-room  he  can 
take  a  sandwich  out  of  his  pocket  and  eat  his 
breakfast !  It's  too  bad  that  when  she  comes  down 
he  can't  present  his  proposal  typewritten — and  oh, 
John  could  propose  so  beautifully  if  all  the  circum- 
stances were  right !  I  can  see  him.  He  would  be 
irresistible  in  his  magnetism,  his  sincerity,  his  ab- 
sorption. Do  you  think  I'd  have  married  you  if 
you  had  approached  me  in  that  way,  Lindley 
Belmore?" 

"Well,  I  was  in  tennis  flannels,  and  we  were 
sitting  on  the  beach  under  a  parasol." 

"It  wasn't  at  eight  o'clock  in  the  morning  and 
you  had  been  looking  at  me  for  days  in  a  way  that 
led  up  to  it — and  why  did  I  take  that  favorite 
Viennese  parasol,  do  you  suppose?" 

"I  can  send  a  telegram  to  John  saying  that  he 
has  mistaken  the  route  and  to  await  further  in- 
structions from  Fanny,"  Lindley  suggested. 

"Silly !  When  he  has  gone  all  the  way  to  Wash- 
ington to  propose !    Why,  you  ought  to  know  that 

214 


Castles  and  a  Gothic  Girl 

one  must  pretend  never  to  interfere  with  such 
things.  It  is  a  case  of  leading  with  invisible 
strings.  I  can't  explain,,  for  you  don't  understand 
such  things,  or  Geraldine,  either.  He'll  bring  the 
thing  to  her  mind,  and  now  you  must  leave  all  the 
rest  to  me.  To  pay  for  your  bungling  you  must 
drop  everything  and  go  to  Wentwood  as  soon  as 
the  election  is  over  and  John  is  free.  He  must 
come,  and  Geraldine  and  Lucy  and  Carniston, 
too,  and  you're  not  to  tell  any  one  of  them  that 
the  others  are  invited.  You  are  simply  to  leave 
everything  to  me.  Four  hearts,  not  four  railroads, 
are  concerned." 

He  assented  humbly,  and  made  his  plans  to  go 
to  Virginia  accordingly. 


215 


XXI 

A  SOLDIER  FROM  THE  FIELD 

THE  rough  and  true  soldiers  whose  life  John 
shared  fought  with  ballots  instead  of  steel. 
No  romance  of  war  clung  to  their  leader,  dusty, 
dishevelled,  and  fresh  from  the  hard-fought  field. 
After  two  or  three  hours'  sleep  snatched  in  an 
upper  berth,  he  was  finding  that  the  impetuous 
decision  reached  by  candlelight  had  taken  the 
shape  of  a  fantasy  in  the  morning.  The  ill- 
assorted  luxury  of  the  room  into  which  he  was 
shown  made  him  unpleasantly  conscious  that  his 
coat  was  wrinkled,  his  hair  carelessly  combed,  and 
his  tan  shoes  unpolished. 

On  arising,  Geraldine  had  received  his  over- 
night telegram  with  its  perplexing  request  that  she 
would  see  him  at  nine,  without  the  slightest  sus- 
picion of  its  true  object  entering  her  mind.  The 
sunlight  of  the  clear  October  morning  filtered 
temptingly  through  the  network  of  the  curtains, 
and  she  concluded  that  if  he  were  going  to  stay 
only  an  hour  she  would  have  the  exercise  for  which 
her  mood,  the  air,  and  the  day  called.     When  she 

216 


A  Soldier  from  the   Field 

appeared  in  the  doorway  before  Frane  in  her 
riding-habit,  buoyant  and  fresh,  the  meaning  of 
her  little  start  of  surprise  which  was  due  to  his 
pallor  he  mistook  as  directed  at  the  carelessness  of 
his  attire. 

"I  hurried  on  here,  Geraldine — well" — where 
was  the  rush  of  words  which  were  at  his  tongue's 
end  the  night  before?  His  thoughts  had  become 
so  crowded  that  none  was  left  with  a  definite  form 
of  expression — "well,  I've  come  for  the  purpose," 
he  smiled  weakly,  "of  asking  a  stay  in  hypothet- 
ical proceedings  which  are  based  possibly  more  on 
apprehension  than  information." 

"That  sounds  most  dreadful,  chums,"  she  said. 

She  was  still  trying  to  comprehend  how  one  who 
looked  so  ruddy  as  he  did  when  he  left  the  steamer 
could  have  so  changed  in  three  weeks.  It  was  char- 
acteristic of  her  thoughtfulness,  however,  that  she 
did  not  mention  her  impression  for  fear  that  it 
might  hurt  him. 

"Have  you  had  breakfast?"  she  asked. 

He  admitted  that  he  had  not.  It  seemed  that 
there  were  four  instead  of  two  figures  in  the  Bou- 
guereau  on  the  wall.  He  had  not  eaten  since  six 
the  night  before,  and  he  was  train  faint  and  hunger 
faint. 

"Then,  let  us  talk  about  the  hypothesis  in  the 
dining-room,  chums,"  she  said. 

217 


Lucy  of  the  Stars 

"You  see,  I  was  thinking  of  the  half-hour  with 
you,  Geraldine,"  John  explained,  "and  then  if  I 
had  time  afterwards  I  could  get  a  cup  of  coffee  and 
a  sandwich  at  the  station — and  I  was  sure  of  lunch- 
eon on  the  dining-car,  anyway.'' 

When  they  were  seated  she  asked  him  if  he  was 
in  the  habit  of  swallowing  coffee  and  sandwiches 
as  he  ran.  He  laughed  apologetically  and  said 
that  he  was  on  occasion.  She  shuddered  at  the 
idea  and  scolded  him  in  a  sisterly  way. 

The  food  revived  him.  He  ate  with  nervous 
rapidity,  glancing  at  his  watch  at  intervals.  She 
kept  thinking  how  tired  he  looked. 

"And  what  is  the  hypothesis?"  she  asked. 

Could  Lindley  have  overheard  John's  lame  be- 
ginning and  his  lamer  progress  he  would  have  had 
all-convincing  proof  of  his  wife's  superior  wisdom. 
In  broken  sentences  he  explained  how  the  letter 
Fanny  had  received  from  Mrs.  Hodges  was  re- 
sponsible for  his  journey. 

"I  don't  think  she  quite  meant  that,"  for  Geral- 
dine always  protected  her  mother. 

Then  he  repeated  Lindley's  information  about 
the  will. 

"So  I  came  to  tell  you  what  I  have  had  on  my 
mind  for  years — to  tell  you  that  I  love  you." 

The  light  from  the  window  was  on  her  face,  a 
face  that  was  always  fine  but  never  mobile.     He 

218 


A   Soldier  from  the   Field 

saw  her  brown  eyes  open  wide  as  they  used  to  when 
she  was  a  small  girl  and  he  told  her  a  wonder  tale. 
Beyond  this  there  was  no  agitation;  she  remained 
the  serene  Geraldine.  Her  friends  said  that  she 
was  so  good  to  look  at  that  she  need  not  talk. 
Surely  she  had  never  been  gifted  in  words. 

"You've  always  thought  this?"  she  asked,  "and 
you  never  told  me?" 

He  had  put  a  bogy  into  her  fairyland  of  wealth 
and  ease,  he  concluded.  His  aspect  and  posi- 
tion in  her  mind,  as  she  looked  at  him  out  of 
the  windows  of  her  house  golden,  became  com- 
prehensible in  a  flash  of  what  seemed  to  him 
naked  truth. 

"Yes,  always,  Geraldine." 

He  saw  her  eyes  growing  moist,  and  he  felt  that 
he  was  hurting  her. 

"What  a  drag  I  would  be  on  you  if  I  hadn't  a 
penny,"  she  said. 

She,  who  knew  that  he  was  eloquent,  wondering, 
saw  that  she  struck  no  fire  with  this  remark.  If 
Fanny  could  have  been  present  unseen  and  have 
whispered  to  John  unheard  she  would  have  said: 
"Now,  now  is  your  time!  Seize  her  hand  and 
plead,  plead  with  all  the  ardour  and  sincerity  of 
your  big  heart !"  But  the  famous  talker  was  silent, 
thinking  of  twenty-two  giving  up  its  patrimony 
for  the  privilege  of  sharing  the  burdens  of  thirty- 

219 


Lucy  of  the  Stars 

five,  which  was  the  sum  of  his  request  as  it  must 
appeal  to  her. 

"You  are  to  have  a  great  meeting  to-night,"  she 
went  on,  tentatively. 

"Yes,"  he  answered,  and  he  was  calculating  the 
time  necessary  to  reach  his  train. 

"Do  you  think  that  you  will  be  elected?"  she 
asked. 

"I  say  I  shall.  That  is  the  thing  to  do.  I  don't 
know.  I  don't  think  about  it  that  way.  It  is  the 
campaign,  the  game !  That  is  wine  to  me  every 
moment."  He  seemed  to  be  straining  at  the  leash, 
and  glanced  at  his  watch  hurriedly.  "I  must  be 
going."  When  he  turned  to  look  at  her  again  at 
the  door,  he  saw  a  tear  on  the  face  that  was  still 
serene.  "How  I  have  hurt  her!"  he  thought, 
"letting  her  know  that  I  ever  thought  of  her  in 
that  way!"  And  he  said  "Forgive  me  and  forget 
my  nonsense,"  half  inaudibly,  and  rushed  down  the 
steps. 

Geraldine  went  slowly  up  the  stairs  to  her  room. 
It  was  the  only  room  furnished  to  her  taste  in  that 
house  which  the  cynics  said,  in  comparing  it  with 
the  house  at  Kearn's  Ford,  represented  the  second 
stage.  She  picked  up  the  half-dozen  papers  that 
lay  on  the  bed — all  from  John's  State — and  with 
her  own  hand  cut  out  certain  columns  under  glar- 
ing headlines.     When  her  maid  came  to  say  that 

220 


A  Soldier  from  the  Field 

Lord  Carniston  was  waiting  below,  she  answered 
"Directly;"  and  "directly"  seem  to  mean  after 
she  had  read  every  notice  and  scanned  some  of 
those  that  she  had  filed  away  in  her  desk  the  day 
before. 

"I  do  believe  I  understand  a  little !"  she  thought. 
"How  I  would  like  to  see  him  to-night,  giving  the 
audience  his  whole  heart  and  soul !  What  a  heart 
and  soul  they  are  to  give  and  only  an  audience  will 
ever  receive  them." 

After  she  had  locked  her  desk  she  started  leis- 
urely downstairs,  riding-crop  in  hand.  At  the 
first  landing  was  a  gaudy  Satsuma  vase  which  she 
had  borne  quietly,  as  she  had  everything  else.  This 
morning  it  assaulted  her  eyes  with  an  uncontrol- 
lable repugnance.  Her  mother  sometimes  said  that 
"Geraldine  has  outbreaks,  and  because  she  is  her- 
self in  five  minutes  afterwards  no  one  thinks  that 
she  has  a  temper."  Her  girl  friends  at  school  had 
remarked  that  there  was  more  in  her  than  one 
thought. 

Now  she  brought  the  horn  handle  of  the  crop 
down  upon  the  vase  with  all  the  strength  of  her 
arm — and  how  such  a  character  as  Lucy  or  John 
would  have  loved  her  for  that  blow  which  sent  the 
fragments  scattering!  Mrs.  Hodges,  who  was 
with  the  earl,  had  fairly  leaped  out  of  her  seat 
when  she  heard  the  crash;  and  when  her  daugh- 

221 


Lucy  of  the  Stars 

ter  appeared,  she  asked  if  something  had  been 
broken. 

"Yes,  mother,"  was  the  serene  response.  "Prob- 
ably you  know  already,"  Geraldine  added  lan- 
guidly, turning  to  Carniston,  "how  long  it  takes 
a  woman  to  dress  when  she  is  in  the  mood." 

As  they  went  out  to  the  horses  Carniston  dis- 
tinctly heard  her  humming  under  her  breath  one 
of  Lucy's  never-care  songs. 


222 


XXII 

THE  COURAGE  OF  LEADERSHIP 

THANKS  to  their  interest  in  John's  cam- 
paign the  von  Kars  had  become  ardent 
newspaper  readers.  In  the  afternoon  editions 
which  they  took  aboard  the  train  at  Philadelphia, 
they  caught  the  full  effect  of  the  first  speech  of  the 
eminent  banker  Oliphant,  who  had  been  nomina- 
ted by  the  opposition. 

"Behind  Frane  is  Kennan  and  behind  Kennan  is 
Belmore,"  he  said.  "Elect  this  young  man  and 
you  will  find  that  none  of  the  Belmore  interests 
will  be  opposed." 

Who  was  Frane's  college  chum  and  his  most 
intimate  friend?  Why,  this  same  magnate  who 
had  condescended  to  say  that  in  the  event  of  a 
strike  the  poor  would  still  get  their  coal  at  the  old 
price.  Did  Kennan  make  his  famous  journey  to 
Kearn's  Ford  for  pleasure?  Let  the  No-Strings 
reformer  deny  that  he  had  made  a  deal  with  the 
old  boss!  Let  him  explain  at  the  Kearn's  Ford 
meeting  to-night  why  the  wells  of  his  independence 

223 


Lucy   of  the   Stars 

had  dried  on  the  day  that  Kennan  came  out  in  his 
favour ! 

The  doctor  and  Lucy  both  were  immersed  in 
this  wonderland  of  printer's  ink  when  Frane  him- 
self, who  had  come  on  the  same  train,  interrupted 
them.  Lucy  looked  him  up  and  down  question- 
ingly. 

"I  was  seeking  the  string,"  she  said,  laughing; 
"and  I  was  going  to  say  that  you  were  a  stranger, 
but,  of  course,  you're  not.  You  are  at  the  Bel- 
mores'  morning,  noon,  and  night,  always  running 
the  great  man's  errands." 

This  bit  of  satire  gave  him  his  first  real  laugh 
of  that  long,  hard  day.  He  had  felt  the  veering 
of  independent  sentiment,  and  he  had  begun  to 
realise  the  handicap  of  carrying  a  boss  on  his  back. 
The  name  of  Kennan  was  tainted,  and  no  name 
associated  with  it  could  escape  infection. 

"I  hope  you  have  some  ammunition  in  your 
locker  and  can  give  them  as  good  as  they  send," 
said  the  doctor,  rather  formally;  for  he  still  re- 
fused to  believe  in  Frane.  He  conceived  of  the 
election  as  being  a  rough-and-tumble  battle  of 
demagogues,  and  with  such  his  temperament  had 
little  in  common. 

"Yes,"  Lucy  put  in,  "you  can  do  that  without 
half  trying.  I  know  he's  a  humbug  by  his  picture 
and  the  way  he  talks." 

224 


The  Courage  of  Leadership 

Frane  beamed  over  her  interest  and  partisan- 
ship. When  a  man  who  believes  that  he  is  right 
is  attacked  and  the  battle  is  fierce,  he  wants  com- 
prehension as  well  as  sympathy,  and  he  found  both 
in  her. 

"I  want  to  hear  you  say  something  that  will 
make  him  look  as  small  as  he  really  is,"  she  per- 
sisted. "You  must,"  she  added,  "you  will,  in  your 
speech  to-night,  won't  you?" 

When  she  begged  that  he  would  find  her  and 
her  father  a  place  where  they  could  hear  him,  his 
delight  took  the  form  of  offering  them  a  box  and 
his  escort  to  and  from  the  meeting.  Then  he  made 
his  excuses  and  went  to  join  Kennan,  who  was  in 
the  stateroom  of  the  next  car. 

Kennan's  decision  to  go  to  the  meeting,  as  one 
of  John's  friends  said,  indicated  his  intention  to 
cling  as  close  to  the  candidate  as  matrimony.  He 
and  John  had  not  met  since  Oliphant  had  made 
the  charges.  The  old  boss  was  chewing  an  un- 
lighted  cigar,  and  as  they  shook  hands  his  eyes 
sought  John's  piercingly. 

"Well,  are  you  going  to  throw  me  over  in  that 
speech  of  yours  to-night?"  he  asked  abruptly. 

"No,"  John  answered,  smiling. 

The  boss  regarded  him  narrowly. 

"What  line  are  you  going  to  take?"  he  pursued. 

"You've  tried  your  old  kind  of  politics;  now 
225 


Lucy  of  the  Stars 

I  am  going  to  try  mine — the  new  kind.  It  goes 
without  saying  that  I  am  in  command  of  the  field- 
work." 

"That  'No'  was  all  I  wanted  to  hear.  Go 
ahead,"  the  boss  concluded.  "You've  read 
Oliphant's  speech,"  he  went  on,  giving  the  name 
a  slur  as  he  spoke.  "He's  a  holy  man,  he  is."  It 
was  plain  that  this  speech  had  stirred  him  to  the 
depths.  He  drew  a  letter  from  his  pocket  as  he 
spoke.  "Smug — that's  it.  If  there's  any  kind  of 
man  I  hate,  it's  the  smug  man." 

"So  do  I,"  said  Frane,  heartily. 

"You,  Frane,  could  stand  up  and  say  that  I  had 
done  certain  things,  and  call  me  whatever  you 
pleased  on  that  account,  and  I'd  take  it  and  keep 
my  mouth  shut,  because  I  know  you  wouldn't  do 
those  things  yourself.     Well,  read  that!" 

He  passed  to  Frane  the  note  which  Oliphant, 
in  a  moment  when  he  was  off-guard,  had  written 
only  three  years  before.  It  was  addressed  to 
Kennan,  and  began,  "In  regard  to  our  conversa- 
tion of  yesterday,"  and  it  told  enough  to  show  that 
Oliphant  as  a  business  man  was  willing  to  bribe 
that  same  city  whose  corrupt  rule  he  had  made  his 
battle-cry  as  a  candidate. 

"Oliphant,  of  course,  was  only  the  eminent 
citizen  acting  for  others,"  Kennan  continued.  "If 
we'd  granted  what  they  wanted,  it  would  have  put 

226 


The  Courage  of  Leadership 

the  party  out  for  twenty  years."  He  went  into 
details  as  to  the  scandalous  thing  that  Oliphant 
had  proposed,  the  huge  price  he  had  offered  to  pay; 
and  when  the  list  of  names  of  the  financiers  be- 
hind him  was  given  it  was  a  pleasure  to  Frane  to 
find  that  Belmore's  was  not  among  them. 

"They've  been  driving  me  to  the  wall,"  said  the 
boss,  "and  I've  concluded  it's  about  time  I  talked 
back.  You  can  make  these  charges  against  Oli- 
phant to-night  if  you  like,  and  if  he  denies  them, 
I'll  substantiate."  Thus  the  boss  had  proffered  a 
sensation  which  would  turn  the  tide  of  suspicion 
from  John's  direction  to  that  of  his  opponent. 

John  had  grasped  the  opportunity  the  instant 
he  had  read  the  note  and  had  already  considered  it. 
The  new  school  of  politics  treated  Kennan  to  an- 
other surprise  when  he  said  quietly  that  he  was  not 
going  to  mention  Oliphant's  name  that  evening. 

"But  thanks !  You've  helped  me  more  than  you 
can  guess." 

So  he  had.  Weary  as  John  was,  the  heart  taken 
out  of  him  by  the  fiasco  of  his  journey,  his  thoughts 
all  the  way  from  Washington  had  harked  back  to 
Geraldine  instead  of  forward  to  the  other  crisis — 
that  of  his  career.  For  the  first  time  he  faced  life 
with  Geraldine  wholly  out  of  the  reckoning.  Out- 
lines for  his  speech  had  come  and  gone  in  his  mind, 
but  with  none  was  there  any  fire,  any  moving  con- 

227 


Lucy  of  the  Stars 

ception.  The  letter  had  centered  his  thoughts 
again.  It  had  recalled  him  to  the  field  of  the  good 
fight.  He  was  facing  a  candidate  for  governor 
who  regarded  his  fair  name  as  a  commercial 
quantity  which  might  be  used  to  cloak  a  franchise 
steal  or  to  elect  him  to  office.  Such  was  the  temper 
of  the  times.  This  America  was  a  land,  not  to 
love,  but  to  exploit  for  personal  ends.  How  were 
the  people  to  know  whom  to  trust  when  their  faith 
was  a  commodity  for  barter  by  those  who  held  it? 
But  John  was  not  to  say  this;  the  idea  for  the 
speech  which  had  come  to  him  involved  no  plati- 
tudes. When  the  train  drew  into  Kearn's  Ford 
he  was  in  the  full  fever  of  the  people's  work  again. 

"I'm  going  to  tell  them  about  our  deal  to- 
night," he  told  the  boss,  expecting  an  explosion; 
but  none  came. 

Well  the  old  warrior  knew  that  victory  de- 
pended upon  John's  personality.  According  to 
the  rule  of  the  political  seesaw  it  was  the  turn  of 
his  party  to  be  out.  Could  the  new  kind  of  politics 
and  the  new  leader  keep  it  in?  If  Frane's  indis- 
cretion lost,  then  Frane  was  dead,  and  the  party 
would  come  forward  with  some  other  leader  and 
go  on  in  its  old  way.  Kennan  had  made  equally 
strange  political  bedfellows  before,  but  always 
coldly — the  speech-making  he  left  to  others — as 
one  makes  any  business  transaction.     The  situation 

228 


The  Courage  of  Leadership 

was  new,  in  that  he  had  taken  a  liking  to  Frane; 
and  when  Frane  rose  on  the  stage  of  the  opera 
house  that  evening  the  boss  was  more  nervous 
than  the  speaker  himself.  The  deafening  cheers 
that  greeted  the  candidate  were  to  be  expected. 
This  was  his  home  town ;  it  was  a  partisan  ratifica- 
tion meeting.  But  John  himself  had  detected  a 
weakening  of  enthusiasm  in  the  attitude  of  his 
supporters,  who  he  knew  had  followed  him  as  an 
enemy  of  Kennan  in  every  fight  that  he  had  made 
— and  now  he  and  Kennan  were  on  the  same 
platform. 

Before  John  had  said  half  a  dozen  words  after 
the  applause  had  died  away,  a  voice  sang  out : 

"What  about  your  deal  with  Kennan?  Let's 
have  that  first!" 

The  speaker  had  sounded  the  key-note  for 
Frane,  who  made  himself  heard  above  the  hisses  of 
his  too-ardent  admirers,  and  politely  asked  the 
shouter  to  stand  up  and  state  his  question  in  full; 
and  the  shouter  was  not  bashful. 

"How  can  you  be  a  No-Strings  candidate  and 
be  hitched  up  with  Boss  Kennan?"  he  called, 
bluntly. 

"I  wanted  you  to  ask  that  question,"  Frane  re- 
plied. "I  wanted  you  to  ask  it,  because  you  have 
a  right  to  know,  as  every  citizen  has  a  right  to 
know.     He  cannot  vote  intelligently  until  he  does 

229 


Lucy  of  the  Stars 

know.  Yes,  there  is  a  deal,  and  I  will  tell  you  just 
what  it  is." 

He  took  a  step  nearer  the  audience.  If  Geral- 
dine  could  have  seen  him  then,  instead  of  in  his 
suit  of  awkwardness  and  timidity  that  morning! 
The  audience  leaned  forward  to  meet  him.  This 
word  "deal"  typified  all  the  trickery  of  the  politics 
of  the  time.  Here  was  the  man  whom  the  people 
set  above  all  such  contamination  admitting  that  he 
had  made  a  bargain  with  the  most  reprehensible 
of  bosses.  When  Frane  began  speaking  it  was 
as  if  to  one  of  his  townsmen  in  the  street.  His 
style,  in  the  language  of  Binns,  keeper  of  the 
Ford  House,  was  "looking  you  in  the  eye  and  tell- 
ing you  straight."  Word  for  word  he  related  the 
interview  between  himself  and  Kennan.  He  did 
not  palliate  the  boss  or  shirk  association  with  him. 

uHe  brings  me  his  support.  I  accept  it.  What 
I  told  him  I  would  do  I  shall  do,  and  so  I  tell  you. 
Now  that  you  know  all,  it  is  for  you  to  decide." 
There  he  stopped.  He  had  made  no  conventional 
appeal  for  a  cheer,  but  he  had  spoken  with  such 
force,  such  earnestness  and  directness,  that  the 
table  on  which  at  times  he  rested  his  hand  seemed 
to  shake  with  his  emotion.  The  second  of  silence 
which  followed  the  close  of  the  speech  was  broken 
by  the  man  who  had  asked  the  question. 

"I  guess  it's  more  a  case  of  your  being  the  driver 
230 


I  wanted  you  to  ask  that  question,"  Frane  replied 


The  Courage  of  Leadership 

than  being  hitched,"  he  said;  uand  you're  good 
enough  to  drive  for  me." 

This  spark  brought  an  explosion  of  applause, 
followed  by  thunder  and  tumult  as  the  people 
rose  to  their  feet.  When  the  cheers  had  died 
down  a  United  States  senator  who  was  to  speak 
after  Frane  arose.  But  the  audience  had  only  been 
recovering  its  breath.  The  second  outbreak  was 
more  prolonged  than  the  first;  for  the  more  that 
his  hearers  thought  of  this  example  of  straight- 
forwardness the  more  it  thrilled  them, 

Kennan  had  been  so  affected  that  he  forgot  to 
consider  whether  the  speech  was  good  politics  or 
not. 

"You  told  it  just  as  it  was,"  he  whispered;  uand 
they  believed  you.     I  could  feel  that  they  did." 

Glancing  toward  the  box  which  the  doctor  and 
Lucy  occupied,  John  saw  her  greet  him  with  a 
pantomime  of  approval;  and  then  a  man  from  the 
wings  brought  him  a  note. 

"That  was  splendid  courage,"  she  had  scribbled 
impulsively  on  a  calling-card.  "It  doesn't  matter 
whether  you  are  elected  or  not.  It's  enough  to  be 
able  to  do  such  a  thing." 

Of  all  the  compliments  which  he  heard  when 
the  crowd  swarmed  onto  the  platform  after  the 
meeting  was  over  this  rang  truest  to  him.  The 
doctor  and  Lucy  remained  watching  the  scene  until 

231 


Lucy  of  the  Stars 

Frane  made  it  possible  to  excuse  himself  and  to 
walk  home  with  them. 

"All  great  men  of  action  have  been  gamblers 
in  a  sense,"  the  doctor  observed.  "They  have  not 
hesitated  to  put  all  to  the  hazard  in  a  crisis." 

"Oh,  it  did  not  occur  to  you  that  way,  I  am 
sure/'  said  Lucy,  looking  questioningly  at  John,  as 
if  fearing  that  she  was  to  have  an  ideal  shattered. 
"It  was  right  to  tell  them  and  you  did.  Therein 
lies  your  triumph.' ' 

"You  understand,"  he  said  to  Lucy,  in  the  fer- 
vour of  fellowship.  He  was  in  the  afterglow  of 
his  effort,  radiant,  cheery,  boyish.  In  his  outburst 
of  confidence  he  told  her  more  of  his  aims  than  he 
had  vouchsafed  to  any  one  for  many  years.  Rap- 
idly he  talked  and  eloquently — more  eloquently 
than  on  the  platform — all  the  way  up  the  hill, 
while  she,  listening,  realised  the  intimate  charm  of 
his  personality.  When  they  reached  the  gate  he 
stopped  suddenly,  as  if  he  had  been  caught  in  an 
indiscretion. 

There  was  a  touch  of  exhaustion  or  sadness  in  his 
good-night  and  in  hers.  He  was  wishing  that  Geral- 
dine  could  have  been  in  her  place.  He  would  not 
have  expected  Geraldine  to  understand  his  remarks 
in  just  the  same  way  that  Lucy  could.  To  have 
her  at  his  side  would  be  enough.  Lucy  was  think- 
ing if  it  had  only  been  Carniston  who  had  been 

232 


The  Courage  of  Leadership 

speaking  with  such  a  set  purpose,  so  free  of  the 
trammels  of  yesterdays  and  so  concerned  with  the 
to-morrows —  if  Carniston  would  only  stake  all  on 
the  hazard.  She  would  not  want  or  expect  him  to 
be  as  brilliant  as  this  man  was. 

"I  have  witnessed  to-night  the  theatrics  of  an 
American  political  meeting,"  Dr.  von  Kar  wrote 
in  his  diary.  "You  have  been  the  confidant  of  my 
many  inconsistencies,  little  book.  You  have  seen  N 
friendships  grow  and  harden  or  melt  away,  and 
you  have  smiled  at  me,  thinking  that  the  day's 
exasperation  which  directed  my  pen  would  soon  be 
forgotten.  I  have  to  confess  to-night  that  I  was 
wrong  about  Frane.  He  is  a  demagogue,  but  with 
the  difference  that  he  is  a  good  demagogue.  He 
is  honest.  He  is  free  of  heart,  and  not  the  least 
of  his  virtues  is  that  he  has  a  contempt  for  money." 

Yet  before  he  fell  asleep,  the  doctor  ran  happily 
over  the  figures  of  his  own  fortune. 


233 


XXIII 

NOT  A  MATTER  OF  IMPULSE 

GARNISTON  had  done  that  thing;  and  gal- 
lantly, some  schools  of  chivalry  may  hold. 
No  parental  frowns  of  disapproval  dammed  the 
words  of  the  bashful  suitor  as  he  spoke  the  lesson 
which  he  had  rehearsed.  Mrs.  Hodges'  sighs  over 
the  prospective  loss  of  her  daughter  were  percep- 
tibly softened  by  her  outbreathings  of  delight. 
Over  further  details  we  shall  draw  the  veil  of  pri- 
vacy, after  remarking  that  she  had  not  been  al- 
together frank  in  explaining  the  extent  to  which 
the  estate  was  in  the  hands  of  Lindley  Belmore. 
He  had  done  that  thing,  and  yet  he  felt  none  of 
the  relief  of  a  duty  performed,  a  road  definitely 
chosen.  As  he  walked  back  to  the  embassy  he 
found  himself  looking  forward  to  the  proposal 
he  was  to  make  to  Geraldine — he  and  not  her 
mother  was  to  speak  to  her  first — only  in  the  antic- 
ipation that  she  might  refuse.  And  if  she  did, 
he  thought — if  all  the  girls  to  whom  he  offered 
his  hand  should  refuse  in  the  same  way  that  they 
had   refused   little    Count   de   Malmenberg,   who 

234 


Not  a  Matter  of  Impulse 

had  literally  circularised  the  eligible  girls  of  the 
capital !  Then  he  would  have  done  his  duty  with 
noble  persistence,  and  he  could  say  "go  hang"  to 
Wormley  and  the  creditors. 

It  seemed  to  him  while  he  was  talking  with 
Mrs.  Hodges  that  Lucy  had  been  overhearing  and 
overlooking  them.  He  could  see  her  smile  and 
hear  her  banter  him  in  mimicry.  Was  it  she  who 
was  suggesting  to  him  that  he  might  propose  to 
Geraldine  in  such  a  way  that  acceptance  would  be 
out  of  the  question?  And  why  not?  he  asked  him- 
self as  he  entered  the  embassy  door. 

But  two  letters  that  awaited  him  overthrew  his 
realm  of  fancy.  A  long  one  from  Wormley  in 
unconscious  satire  alternately  reminded  him  of  his 
duty  and  wished  him  happiness  in  its  performance. 
This  unctuous  gentleman  said  that  proud  as  the 
native  millionaire  was  to  have  a  titled  daughter, 
his  inherent  fondness  for  driving  a  hard  bargain 
should  warn  any  intending  suitor  who  was  inex- 
perienced in  business  to  be  on  his  mettle.  By 
involution,  and  yet  clearly  enough,  he  advocated 
a  careful  examination  of  the  field  before  making 
a  choice,  aiming  high  and  thinking  of  no  arrange- 
ment for  less  than  thirty  thousand  pounds  a  year. 

A  note  from  Fanny  Belmore  recalled  Carnis- 
ton's  promise  to  visit  Wentwood,  whither  she  and 
Lucy,  she  said,  were  going  in  two  days.     If  he 

235 


Lucy  of  the  Stars 

had  any  engagement  in  town  he  could  run  in 
and  back  again  in  the  automobile.  The  signifi- 
cance of  this  to  him  was  that  Lucy  was  coming 
into  his  horizon  again.  If  she  were  not  at  Went- 
wood  she  would  be  in  Washington.  After  all  the 
dumb  show,  the  pantomime  of  wife-hunting,  he 
was  hungrier  for  her  than  he  had  ever  been  before. 
Bender  and  Mrs.  Hodges  and  the  others  of  their 
unreal  world  had  made  him  homesick  for  his  Eng- 
land and  the  English  girl  that  he  loved.  He  was 
weak  and  amiable  and  a  fool,  or  he  would  find 
some  way  out  of  the  situation,  he  told  himself  for 
the  hundredth  time.  After  dinner  he  and  Calkins 
sat  together  far  into  the  night.  Theirs  was  the 
growing  comradeship  of  misery. 

"Any  station  in  India  is  better  than  this,  and 
perhaps  a  war  by-and-by,"  said  Calkins.  uAnd 
if  not,  no  matter.  This  game  of  the  white  man's 
civilisation  is  too  fast  for  me.  A  little  breeze  in 
the  evening  in  the  hill  country  is  worth  it  all." 

When  he  awoke  in  the  morning  Carniston  felt 
like  a  man  of  conscience  who  has  turned  bribe- 
giver and  bribe-taker.  There  was  no  putting  back 
now;  he  would  have  to  see  it  through.  He  was 
going  for  a  walk  with  Geraldine  at  eleven,  and 
it  was  his  plan  to  announce  his  suit  before  they 
left  the  house.  While  he  sat  waiting  for  her  to 
come  downstairs  and  rehearsing  his  little  speech, 

236 


Not  a  Matter  of  Impulse 

Lucy  appeared  again  in  one  of  her  never-care 
moods. 

"We  all  see  you,"  she  seemed  to  say;  "go  ahead. 
It's  not  long  since  you  were  proposing  in  another 
drawing-room  on  the  other  side  of  the  Atlantic. 
That  girl,  the  silly!  met  you  at  the  door." 

Because  Lucy  put  him  out,  Mrs.  Hodges,  who 
was  in  her  own  room  ready  to  be  called  to  embrace 
two  dear  children  and  give  them  her  blessing,  real- 
ised that  something  was  wrong  when  from  her 
window  she  saw  them  going  down  the  steps  only 
a  minute  after  Geraldine  had  entered  the  drawing- 
room. 

Had  she  known  how  to  proceed  she  would  have 
prepared  Geraldine  for  the  proposal.  "Nobody 
knows  her  like  me,"  she  had  often  sighed,  "and 
she  is  so  uncertain  and  headstrong."  Ever  bully- 
ing her  daughter,  yet  the  mother  really  feared  her. 
"Geraldine  must;  they  were  made  for  each  other," 
she  thought  desperately  as  she  watched  them 
walking  away. 

Passers-by  cast  sidelong  glances  at  the  handsome 
pair — some  in  admiration,  some  not,  perhaps, 
without  envy  of  their  atmosphere  of  luxury,  good 
health,  position,  and  wealth.  Geraldine  was  beau- 
tiful. Carniston  might  not  walk  with  her  on  a 
clear  November  day  and  resist  a  certain  pleasure 
in  the  thought  of  having  a  creature  so  superb  for 

237 


Lucy  of  the  Stars 

his  companion.     He  must  own  that  he  liked  her 
quality. 

"I  have  something  important  to  say  to  you," 
he  began. 

It  would  have  seemed  extraordinary  to  him  to 
offer  his  hand  in  marriage  while  they  were  walking 
in  the  street  if  anything  had  seemed  extraordinary 
in  his  new  career.  But  it  is  repugnant,  too,  when 
you  love  another  girl,  to  propose  for  duty's  sake  in 
a  drawing-room  where  the  seclusion  requires  that 
the  occasion  be  eloquent — he  could  hear  Lucy  tell- 
ing him  so  with  a  wise  shake  of  her  head.  The 
bargain,  if  bargain  there  was  to  be,  could  be  con- 
cluded here  without  a  scene,  and  yet  quite  in  keep- 
ing with  good  taste  when  the  two  concerned  had 
such  excellent  control  of  their  emotions. 

"I  came  to  ask  you  to  go  back  to  Burbridge 
with  me,"  he  concluded. 

She  had  flushed  a  little  at  his  first  words,  fore- 
seeing the  trend  of  his  speech;  for  she  had  had 
enough  proposals  on  horseback,  on  foot,  in  motors, 
as  well  as  in  the  proverbial  conservatory,  to  recog- 
nise the  signs,  however  unusual.  There  was  noth- 
ing in  her  expression  to  indicate  any  sense  of 
humour  or  the  nature  of  her  final  answer. 

"By  that  you  mean  that  you  ask  me  to  marry 
you,"  she  observed. 

"Yes." 

238 


Not  a  Matter  of  Impulse 

"Of  course  we  shall  need  a  lot  of  money  to  pay 
off  debts  and  fix  up  the  estate,"  she  pursued,  with- 
out the  slightest  touch  of  irony  in  her  voice. 

"Yes,"  he  stammered,  honestly. 

"Such  an  offer  is  always  entitled  to  respectful 
consideration,"  she  said,  "and  if  I  make  inquiry 
it  is — as  a  lawyer  would  say,  I  suppose — with  a 
view  to  the  satisfaction  of  a  full  understanding 
now,  instead  of  the  pain  of  later  disillusionment. 
The  future  relations  that  you  have  suggested  being 
personal  makes  it  allowable,  perhaps,  that  I  should 
be  a  little  personal  before  I  give  my  decision.  So 
I  shall  ask  you  if  you  are  not  in  love  with  Miss 
von  Kar,  as  I  have  guessed." 

Geraldine,  wondering  at  her  facility  in  the  use 
of  long  words,  as  she  put  the  question,  looked 
him  full  in  the  face,  and  she  was  smiling  in  the 
same  impersonal  way  that  she  had  smiled  when 
her  mother  made  the  recital  at  the  dinner  table 
and  when,  indeed,  she  had  broken  the  Satsuma 
vase. 

"Yes,"  he  admitted  drily,  while  he  heard  the 
voice  of  Lucy  calling  him  a  cad. 

"And  you  were  engaged?"  she  pursued  quietly. 
"Or  wasn't  it  like  that?"  Her  manner  being  that 
of  right  took  the  edge  of  impertinence  off  the 
question. 

"Yes,  we  were.  It  was  quite  like  that," 
239 


Lucy  of  the  Stars 

he  said,  proudly.  "She  sent  me  away/'  he 
added. 

"It  is  fine  of  you  to  say  so,"  and  she  gave  him 
an  approving  look.  "Let  it  be  so.  But  there  sud- 
denly came  into  your  life  a  condition  which  forced 
you  to  marry  for  money,  and  you  swallowed  your 
pill  manfully,  and,  after  looking  over  the  field, 
I  am  your  choice." 

"Yes,  oh,  yes!"  he  said,  pathetically  and  in  con- 
fusion ;  and  it  was  some  satisfaction  to  hear  Lucy's 
voice  calling:  "Hurrah  for  the  world  of  truth  and 
light  and  faith!" 

"  'For  the  love  that  kings  in  courting  lost,'  " 
Geraldine  repeated  softly  and  hummed  the  measure 
through;  while  he  recalled  the  afternoon  on  board 
the  steamer  when  Lucy  had  sung.  "Miss  von  Kar 
is  extremely  clever,"  Geraldine  finally  observed. 

"Scarcely  more  clever  than  one  other  woman  I 
know,"  he  said. 

"I  mean  that  if  she  has  a  thought  she  can  put 
it  into  words  or  music  in  a  way  that  rings  a  bell 
all  round  and  makes  you  wish  that  you  had  the 
same  key  to  unlock  the  door  in  your  forehead. 
Her  thoughts  are  in  her  eyes  and  on  her  lips,  and 
what  she  is  you  know.  Mr.  Frane  has  that 
quality.  He  says  no  and  yes,  and  I  will  and  I 
will  not,  and  I  think  this  and  I  think  that;  but 
then  you  feel  that  you  see  all  there  is  in  his  mind 

240 


Not  a  Matter  of  Impulse 

and  heart.    It  is  quite  different  from  having  your 
face  always  a  mask. 

"Did  you  ever  look  at  the  diamonds  in  a  shop 
window  and  feel  the  repulsion  of  so  much  bril- 
liance and  as  if  you  didn't  care  for  diamonds  any 
more  than  for  the  glass  on  a  chandelier?  And 
then  did  you  ever  have  a  diamond  that  you  loved 
for  its  shape  or  some  thought  associated  with  it? 
You  see,  there  are  clever  people  in  this  world  who 
can  give* you  a  thought  or  a  smile  that  means  more 
than  a  show  window  full  of  brilliance — Miss  von 
Kar  can.  Though  she  is  not  beautiful  to  look  at 
at  first,  when  you  have  known  her  a  day  or  two 
then  she  is  good  to  look  at  forever,  and  it  is  dear 
to  be  near  her.     Isn't  that  it?" 

"Yes,"  he  faltered,  when  he  wanted  fairly  to 
shout  that  it  was. 

They  were  across  Lafayette  Square  now,  and  she 
signalled  to  a  newsboy  and  bought  the  first  edition 
of  an  evening  paper  for  the  latest  returns. 

For  John  Frane  had  been  elected  governor  the 
day  before  by  a  majority  that  had  made  the 
startled  country  see  in  him  a  great  national  figure. 
Geraldine's  heart  had  been  tingling  all  the  morn- 
ing with  his  triumph.  Yet  she  had  not  mentioned 
her  happiness  to  any  one. 

"One  hundred  and  eighty  thousand  now — more 
and  more,"  she  said,  half  to  herself. 

241 


Lucy  of  the  Stars 

Then  her  eye  caught  another  headline,  announc- 
ing her  engagement  to  Carniston  on  the  best  of 
authority,  and  two  burning  spots  came  into  her 
cheeks.  It  was  in  her  usual  voice,  however,  with 
its  slight  lisp  and  monotone,  that  she  observed 
that  they  might  as  well  turn  away  from  the  line 
of  the  street  cars. 

When  they  were  back  in  the  square  she  showed 
Carniston  the  paper,  with  her  finger  on  the  an- 
nouncement. 

"I  see  that  it  is  to  be  the  social  event  of  the 
season,"  she  said  before  he  could  speak,  "and 
probably  the  most  brilliant  wedding  ever  celebrated 
in  Washington. " 

He  found  some  stumbling  words  to  express  his 
deep  regret  at  such  an  awkward  error  and  his 
willingness  to  do  anything  in  his  power  to  amend  it. 

"You  saw  my  mother  before  you  spoke  to  me  on 
this  subject?"  she  asked.  And  when  he  nodded 
she  went  on:  "Naturally  you  would.  It  was  not 
right  to  go  to  the  girl  till  you  knew  that  conditions 
permitted  you  to  propose." 

"Yes,  I  couldn't  quite  follow  the  American 
custom,  you  see." 

"Which  possibly  you  did  in  Miss  von  Kar's 
case,  and  that,  too,  naturally." 

"Yes,  and  afterwards  she  went  to  my  father." 
He  was  trying  to  laugh  as  the  whole  history  came 

242 


Not  a  Matter  of  Impulse 

back  to  him  mortally  and  bitterly.  "But  I  pro- 
test, we  are  not  talking  about  her,"  he  half 
pleaded,  hoping  to  change  the  subject,  but  finding 
his  wit  too  dumb  to  do  so  for  himself. 

"Of  course.  You  have  asked  me  a  question  and 
in  courtesy  I  ought  to  answer,  even  if  The  Evening 
Star  has  already  settled  the  matter.  When  you 
have  money  will  you  go  into  politics  and  try  to 
make  a  career?" 

"That's  rather  difficult  for  me.  One  ought  to 
be  in  the  Commons  to  accomplish  anything.  I'm 
a  peer,  you  see.  I've  been  interested  in  science 
mostly."  He  recalled  Brent's  remarks,  and  it 
occurred  to  him  that  this  girl  who  had  divined  his 
love  for  Lucy  was  now  revealing  to  him  the  mo- 
notony of  his  future. 

"It's  a  great  honour  you  have  done  me,  I  am 
sure,"  she  said.  "It  will  be  quite  easy  for  us  to 
consider  it  seriously,  for  we  are  both  so  rational. 
Therefore,  I'll  not  act  impulsively." 

He  wondered  if  she  were  laughing  at  him 
behind  her  smile  or  if  she  left  open  the  chance 
to  accept  him  in  the  same  matter-of-fact  way,  some 
morning  when  they  were  walking  or  driving,  that 
he  had  proposed  to  her;  and  with  her  quite  the 
mistress  of  the  situation,  and  with  him  nonplussed, 
she  led  the  conversation  into  other  channels. 

Her  mother  had  been  watching  from  the  win- 

243 


Lucy  of  the  Stars 

dow  for  her  return.  Madame  could  conceal  her 
curiosity  no  longer.  All  excitement,  she  met  her 
daughter  at  the  head  of  the  stairs. 

"Gerry,  did  he— did  he ?" 

"Have  you  read  The  Evening  Star,  mother?" 
the  daughter  asked.  When  Mrs.  Hodges  saw  the 
headlines  her  face  blanched.  She  quavered  that 
she  had  only  told  her  social  secretary — nobody  else. 

"I  will  call  up  The  Evening  Star"  and  Geral- 
dine  reached  for  the  receiver. 

"But — Gerry — you   break    my   heart — I " 

"Main  2440,"  Geraldine  was  saying.  "Yes, 
Mrs.  Hodges  wishes  to  speak  to  you  about  an  item 
in  this  evening's  paper."  She  held  her  hand  over 
the  mouthpiece.  "Now,  mother,"  she  added;  and 
the  weaker  vessel  gave  way. 

When  Mrs.  Hodges  had  sputtered  an  absolute 
denial  Geraldine,  without  further  comment,  took 
the  paper  from  her  mother's  hand  and  went  to  her 
room,  where  she  read  every  word  of  the  returns 
that  concerned  John  Frane. 


244 


XXIV 


THROUGH  ANOTHER'S  EYES 


NOT  quite  up  to  Dingwall's  record  but  ex- 
traordinarily prompt,  and  congratulations 
just  the  same,"  ran  the  telegram  which  Carniston 
received  from  Lucy  the  next  morning.  She  had 
been  the  first  at  the  Belmores'  to  see  the  despatch, 
with  a  Washington  date  line,  in  the  Kearn's  Ford 
evening  paper  which  was  lying  unopened  in  the 
hall  as  they  came  down  to  dinner. 

"I  was  sure  our  Gothic  girl  could  not  resist  be- 
coming a  countess,"  she  observed  to  Fanny,  who 
cried  that  it  was  all  wrong  and  shameful  as  she 
looked  appealingly  at  Lindley. 

"I  don't  think  she  is  a  Gothic  girl,"  he  said 
finally,  breaking  his  silence  for  the  first  time  since 
he  had  read  the  news.  He  was  not  touching  his 
soup. 

"The  question  is,  I  believe,  is  Miss  Hodges  a 
Gothic  girl?"  said  the  doctor,  who  saw  that  there 
was  a  gap  in  the  conversation.  "Gothic!  Miss 
Hodges  is  stately.     Perhaps  she  is  Renaissance." 

"Make  it  Greek  with  a  tailor-made  suit,"  chimed 

245 


Lucy  of  the  Stars 

in  Lucy,  laughing — how  could  she  laugh  when  that 
news  was  surging  in  her  heart? — -"for  we  all  ad- 
mit— they  are  so  far  away — that  the  Greeks  had 
all  the  beauty  and  the  form  and  the  wit,  mytho- 
logically,  classically,  and  gloriously;  but  they 
lacked  motors  and  modern  improvements.  Add 
the  tailor-made  suit  and  you  have  perfection." 

"Flippant!"  exclaimed  Fanny,  crossly. 

UA  beautiful  woman  is  the  most  beautiful  thing 
in  the  world,  and  Miss  Hodges  is  truly  beautiful." 
The  doctor  found  the  fish  excellent  and  the  en- 
gagement of  another  one  of  the  millions  on  mil- 
lions of  couples  on  this  planet  an  abstract  and  not 
a  concrete  subject.  "They  tell  me  that  your  Amer- 
ican women  have  come  to  like  titles.  Some  of  us 
had  hoped  vainly  that  America  would  let  quality 
be  its  own  insignia  and  forego  the  label  which  may 
descend  to  bad  goods." 

"Perhaps  that  is  true  with  some  of  us,"  said  Bel- 
more  drily. 

"And  decidedly  not  of  Geraldine,"  Fanny  fairly 
snapped.  She  was  not  out  of  temper  with  those 
at  the  table,  but  with  the  world.  "It's  all  owing 
to  her  mother,  I'm  sure,"  she  added.  "I  foresaw 
it  on  the  steamer.  But  an  engagement  is  not  a 
wedding.  Lin,  I  shall  see  Geraldine  day  after  to- 
morrow, when  I  shall  tell  her  precisely  what  I 
think.     We're  going  to  Wentwood  immediately." 

246 


Through  Another's  Eyes 

This  was  the  last  meal  that  the  four  were  to  eat 
together  at  Kearn's  Ford,  and  it  was  most  discon- 
certing to  the  doctor,  to  whom  dinner  was  a  genial 
function,  to  find  the  orchestra  out  of  tune.  He 
proceeded,  however,  along  the  path  of  disquisition, 
enjoying  his  own  remarks.  On  the  next  day  he  was 
going  to  New  York.  He  had  presented  one  of 
Brent's  letters  and  that  had  led  to  a  chain  of  invi- 
tations which  he  could  not  well  refuse. 

The  honours  extended  by  different  schools  and 
societies  flattered  him  a  little,  and  were  really  very 
acceptable  at  a  time  when  the  factory  was  in  the 
hands  of  the  builders  and  he  had  no  responsibility 
except  to  write  in  his  diary.  He  had  come  to 
America,  it  is  true,  thinking  of  a  holiday  in  Lucy's 
company,  and  Lucy,  deceiving  herself,  had  come 
thinking  only  of  a  holiday  with  him;  and  now  the 
inspiration  which  was  to  carry  them  away  together 
on  a  journey  of  exploration,  as  they  had  planned, 
failed  to  develop.  He  was  leaving  the  one  who 
was  the  soul  of  his  existence  at  a  time  when,  if  he 
had  been  near  her,  he  might  have  learned  her  secret 
— which  spells  the  word  money  again. 

So  father  and  daughter  separated  at  Phila- 
delphia, Lucy  and  Fanny  proceeding  to  the  Bel- 
mores'  Virginia  place,  where  Lindley  was  to  join 
them  in  two  or  three  days.  John  Frane  they  left 
behind    buried    in    telegrams    of    congratulation. 

247 


Lucy  of  the  Stars 

Among  them  was  a  "Splendid,  splendid,  splendid, 
chums,"  which  he  took  to  mean  a  charitable  and 
friendly  thought  and  nothing  more. 

Fanny,  after  a  day's  thought  and  a  night's  sleep, 
was  still  determined  to  avoid  all  effort  at  diplomacy 
and  to  scold  Geraldine  with  one  breath  and  plead 
with  her  in  the  next.  At  the  station  in  Washington 
the  headlines  informed  her  of  the  positive  denial 
of  the  engagement  by  Mrs.  Hodges  herself.  The 
papers  had  made  so  much  and  in  such  a  way  of  the 
matter  that  Mrs.  Hodges  was  wholly  discouraged, 
Geraldine  ashamed,  and  the  earl  confounded. 

"Now  you  see  she  is  no  Gothic  girl  who  loves 
titles!"  Fanny  cried. 

"Oh,  yes,  she  is,"  said  Lucy,  whose  heart  was 
bounding. 

"If  she  were  really  a  Gothic  girl  who  loved 
titles  do  you  think  she  would  refuse  such  a  hand- 
some earl?"  Fanny  continued.  "The  earl  first 
spoke  to  mamma,  and  mamma,  quite  running  away 
with  the  bait,  told  the  social  secretary,  who  hinted 
it  to  the  society  reporter,  and  the  society  reporter, 
who  had  heard  of  the  walks  and  rides  together, 
made  what  they  call  a  good  story,  which  was  put 
in  print  so  all  the  world  might  see.  Then  Geral- 
dine saw  it,  and  pr-r-r! — for  she  is  a  devil  when 
she  is  roused." 

"She  is?"  Lucy  asked. 

248 


Through  Another's  Eyes 

"Yes;  she  is  so  repressed  that  when  her  feelings 
do  break  out  they  come  with  a  rush."  ■ 

Lucy  knitted  her  brows  in  wonder. 

"Nevertheless,  she  will  marry  Arthur,"  she 
repeated. 

When  Fanny  reached  the  Hodges'  she  said 
nothing  of  the  engagement;  that  could  rest  for 
the  present.  She  refused  to  take  off  her  wraps 
unless  Geraldine  agreed  to  come  to  Wentwood 
that  very  night;  and  Geraldine  was  glad  to  escape 
from  her  mother,  who  took  rather  hearty  meals 
in  bed  and  was  always  crying  when  her  daughter 
appeared. 

It  chanced  that  night  that,  Fanny  retiring  early, 
the  two  girls  had  a  chat  in  Lucy's  room.  Lucy's 
talk  was  alive  with  all  the  detail,  interpreted  ac- 
cording to  her  own  genius,  of  what  had  occurred 
at  Kearn's  Ford  since  the  group  of  steamer  friends 
had  parted  on  the  pier.  Through  the  eyes  of  an- 
other Geraldine  saw  the  scene  in  the  opera  house 
when  John  spoke.  From  the  lips  of  another  she 
heard  every  word  that  John  said  as  he  walked  up 
the  hill  at  the  side  of  this  foreign  girl  on  the  night 
that  he  crossed  his  Rubicon. 

"Lin  and  Fanny  were  not  there?"  Geraldine 
asked. 

"The  terrible  monopolists !  I  know  they  wanted 
to  go,  but  they  remained  away  because  they  knew 

249 


Lucy  of  the  Stars 

that  their  presence  would  be  construed  against  him. 
Wasn't  that  splendid?" 

"And  that  night,  after  he  had  done  the  finest, 
greatest  thing  in  all  his  career,  did  he  speak  of  his 
old  friends?" 

Geraldine  meant,  did  he  speak  of  her,  and  she 
might  have  betrayed  her  meaning  had  it  not  been 
for  her  naturally  controlled  manner. 

"Why,  he  wasn't  thinking  of  them  any  more 
than  he  was  thinking  of  himself.  He  was  think- 
ing only  of  the  hundreds  of  thousands  who  would 
read  his  speech  to-morrow — would  they  under- 
stand him?"  replied  Lucy. 

This  was  a  surprise  to  Geraldine,  who  had  al- 
ways thought  of  John  and  his  power  as  being  per- 
sonal. What  woman  thinks  otherwise  of  the  man 
who  interests  her  deeply?  Evidently  he  had  not 
spoken  or  thought  of  her.  He  could  know  no  real 
love  except  love  of  his  work,  and  marriage  to  him 
would  mean  only  intellectual  affinity. 

Geraldine,  whose  manner  was  so  impersonal, 
was  at  heart  altogether  personal.  Half  charmed, 
half  rebellious,  she  listened  as  Lucy,  all  uncon- 
scious of  the  truth  that  lay  hidden  under  the  ex- 
terior of  this  sphinx  of  a  girl,  went  on  from  the 
night  of  the  speech  to  the  night  when  the  returns 
came  in. 

"We  went  to  that,  too,  daddy  and  I,"  she  said. 
250 


Through   Another's  Eyes 

"Wasn't  it  fine  of  him  to  invite  two  foreigners? 
We  hadn't  even  seen  anything  of  the  kind  at 
home,  and  your  ways  are  different  to  ours.  I  be- 
came so  interested  in  the  campaign  and  I  came  to 
know  so  many  of  the  people  connected  with  it,  that  I 
feel  like  a  politician  myself.  Mr.  Frane  returned 
the  night  before  election,  after  his  last  speech  in 
Philadelphia.  Election  day  was  his  first  free,  quiet 
day.  He  said  he  felt  like  a  young  lawyer  when 
the  jury  went  out  on  his  first  case.  He  sent  up  to 
know  if  I  wouldn't  go  riding  with  him.  It  was 
good  to  see  him  so  rested  and  care-free.  He  said 
that  the  one  delightful  thing  about  politics  was 
that  you  were  in  it  thick  until  the  very  minute  you 
stopped  and  you  stopped  the  night  before  the  elec- 
tion without  any  ends  dragging. 

"I  waited  outside  on  my  horse  while  he  went  in 
to  vote;  for  I  wanted  to  see  that,  too.  The  pho- 
tographers were  at  his  heels,  and  I  judge  that  if 
any  of  them  got  a  good  one  of  him  it  would  be 
published.  His  attitude  is  very  different  to  Mr. 
Belmore's,  who  tries  to  dodge  them.  That's  the 
reason,  Mr.  Frane  says,  that  his  pictures  in  the 
papers  are  so  good  and  Mr.  Belmore's  so  poor. 

"And,  well — I  like  that  American  word  which 
enables  you  to  jump  from  one  thing  to  another — 
who  were  the  others  in  the  little  office  the  night  we 
received  the  returns?     The  boss  and  his  wife — 

251 


Lucy  of  the  Stars 

bless  her  good  heart,  so  simple  and  unchanging 
and  so  Irish;  for  truly,  the  longer  I  live  the  more 
I  believe  they  were  all  born  to  the  purple — and  the 
proprietor  of  the  Ford  House  and  his  wife,  and 
I  believe  that  was  all  that  had  seats. 

"Back  of  us  the  whole  town,  it  seemed  to  me, 
had  crowded  in,  according  to  order  of  arrival. 
Father,  who  never  fails  to  discourse,  said  that  we 
should  now  see  what  the  millions  were  going  to 
do  to  the  demagogue,  as  he  always  calls  Mr. 
Frane.  The  hotel  proprietor  said  it  was  a  show- 
down and  coming  to  cases,  and  apologised  to  me 
for  using  slang.  But  father  likes  the  demagogue. 
He  has  taken  to  calling  Mr.  Frane  'John,'  and  so 
have  I.  It  seems  so  natural;  every  one  in  Kearn's 
Ford  calls  him  John. 

"Father  and  the  negro  valet  were  nearest  the 
telegraph  instrument.  Wasn't  that  odd — the  man 
from  Africa  and  a  scientist  from  London  with  their 
heads  close  together,  bent  on  the  same  idea !  You 
see  how  we're  being  Americanised.  We'll  be  tak- 
ing out  our  papers  next.  The  negro  was  the  most 
important  of  us  all  except  the  telegrapher,  who 
was  to  tell  us  whether  John  was  elected  or  not. 
John  told  me  afterwards  that  he  was  immensely 
pleased  at  the  telegrapher's  support,  because  no- 
body is  a  hero  to  a  telegrapher. 

"  'I'll  give  it  to  you  straight,  John,'  he  said, 
252 


Through  Another's  Eyes 

'but  if  it's  against  you  I'll  give  it  with  a  breaking 
heart.  If  you  don't  win  this  time  you'll  win  next; 
you'll  win  as  soon  as  the  people  know  you.' 

"John,  of  course,  was  the  coolest  of  all.  He 
was  smiling  at  us  and  all  of  his  friends  who  were 
crowding  in  at  the  door.  You  see,  he  hadn't 
thought  of  himself;  he  had  thought  only  of  the 
cause.  He  had  put  the  truth  as  he  saw  it  very 
clearly  to  those  who  were  to  judge,  and  if  they  were 
against  him  there  was  no  rankling  in  his  heart;  for 
you  were  sure  that  he  would  rather  live  with  his 
friends  in  Kearn's  Ford  than  go  to  the  governor's 
house.  You  see,  he  isn't  like  the  American  he 
describes  who  is  working  always  for  his  own  cabin 
and  his  own  girl ;  he  wants  good  cabins  for  all  the 
others,  and  his  fortune  is  theirs." 

It  seemed  to  Geraldine  that  this  stranger  had 
given  a  true  translatfon  of  John's  nature — so  kind 
that  he  had  come  all  the  way  to  Washington  to 
propose  to  a  girl  who  his  friends  said  was  the  girl 
for  him;  while  not  herself,  but  a  stranger,  had 
shared  his  thoughts  in  the  crisis  of  his  life. 

"The  first  news  we  had  was  from  a  ward  in 
Philadelphia.  The  boss  exclaimed,  'I  expected 
that!'  and  the  telegrapher  exclaimed,  'Humph! 
they're  against  everything  that  John  stands  for, 
anyway.'  He  was  as  nervous  in  his  movements 
as  the  instrument,  and  fearfully  angry.    He  really 

253 


Lucy  of  the  Stars 

didn't  say  'Humph' ;  he  used  a  noun  which  kindly 
theologists  say  represents  only  a  metaphorical 
idea.  John  was  still  smiling  as  he  looked  over  at 
father  and  me  and  hummed  a  never-care  tune ;  for, 
you  see,  we  didn't  know  but  this  first  district  was 
an  indication  of  the  way  all  the  others  would  go. 
It  is  that  way  sometimes,  they  said.  Then  for  a 
minute  we  didn't  get  a  word  except  that  Texas  had 
gone  Democratic.  The  boss  growled,  'What  we 
want  is  news !'  No  doubt  the  telegraph  is  a  grand 
institution.  But  in  the  old  stage-coach  days  people 
weren't  tortured  so  in  ten  minutes  that  they  seemed 
like  ten  hours.  It  was  odd  sitting  there  with  every- 
body silent,  waiting  for  that  little  mechanical  devil 
to  tell  us  whether  John  was  elected  or  not. 

"Then  the  reports  came  in  very  fast,  and  they 
were  all  one  way,  and  everybody  talked ;  and  finally 
the  party  manager  sent  word  that  it  was  at  least 
a  hundred  thousand.  You  wondered  what  the 
candidate  would  do  on  such  an  occasion.  Quite 
the  natural  thing  for  him.  He  put  his  hand  on 
the  big  black  paw  of  the  man  from  Africa  and 
said,  'Jim,  we  win!'  And  the  negro  said,  'By 
Gawd,  we  do,  t'ank  Gawd!' 

"  'No  strings!  no  strings!  I  told  you  so!'  said 
the  hotel  man  Binns.  He  had  been  making 
speeches  all  over  the  State,  and  has  become  quite 
an  orator,  John  says,  by  pretending  not  to  be  one. 

254 


Through   Another's  Eyes 

Then  everybody  nominated  John  for  President 
with  a  cheer;  but  he  explained  to  us  afterwards 
that  all  governors  are  nominated  for  President 
the  night  of  their  election.  The  old  boss  looked 
over  at  him  from  beneath  his  shaggy  eyebrows 
and  said :  Tf  you  think  of  starting  a  primary  school 
for  politicians  you'll  find  me  on  the  front  seat 
learning  how  to  spell.' 

"And,  well,  we  won !  we  won !  I  felt  as  happy 
as  if  I  had  been  elected  governor  myself,  and  so 
did  father.  The  hotel  man  announced  that  there 
were  no  strings  on  his  house  that  night,  and  he 
opened  the  doors  for  the  crowd.  He  had  pro- 
vided a  supper  for  Mr.  and  Mrs.  Kennan  and  him- 
self and  wife  and  John  and  for  the  two  foreign- 
ers, and  I  think  he  put  the  climax  to  what  we  all 
felt  when  he  said  to  John:  'Nobody  could  help 
voting  for  you  if  they  knew  you;  and  don't  you 
lose  your  faults  now  that  you've  got  to  be  gov- 
ernor. We  know  them,  too,  and  we  like  them.' 
John  laughed  and  said  that  if  it  was  his  faults  that 
made  him  popular  he  would  try  to  work  his  virtues 
overtime  while  he  was  in  office. 

"He  had  something  to  say  to  every  one  in 
the  crowd,  and  he  said  it  in  a  way  that  meant, 
'You  helped;  you  did  it  just  as  much  as  I  did.' 
When  we  left  him  he  seemed  to  understand  that 
we  were  two  foreigners  in  wonderland — 'And  you 


Lucy  of  the  Stars 

found  it  worth  while  to  stay  through  it  all!'  he 
said.  'It  was  very  good  of  you.'  Then  father 
quoted  some  Latin  to  him,  and  he  surprised  me 
by  responding  in  Latin  in  the  midst  of  all  that 
turmoil.  Whatever  it  was,  it  quite  rang  the  bell 
with  father.  Therein  lies  his  demagogue's  gift, 
only  father  always  adds  now  that  he  is  a  good 
demagogue  with  a  real  backbone. 

"Well — and  this  is  quite  the  last  well — I've 
been  keeping  you  up  fearfully  late;  but  I  thought 
you'd  be  interested,  as  you  know  John  so  well. 
When  we  reached  the  hill  we  found  the  Belmores 
up.  Of  course  they'd  heard  the  news  over  the  tele- 
phone, but  they  wanted  all  the  details ;  and  Lind- 
ley,  so  quiet  and  so  real,  said,  'Good  old  John 
Frane !'  and  that  is  what  we  all  felt." 

Lucy  slept  like  a  brick  because  she  did  not  love 
John  Frane  and  the  earl's  engagement  to  Geral- 
dine  had  been  denied;  but  Geraldine  lay  awake  all 
night,  rehearsing  the  scene  which  Lucy  had  de- 
scribed as  a  part  of  some  world  whose  doors  were 
locked  for  her. 


256 


XXV 

BREAKING  THE  CIRCUIT 

LYING  in  the  same  pocket  of  Carniston's  port- 
folio was  Wormley's  latest  call  to  duty  and 
a  call  to  the  fresh  air  and  open  country.  It  was 
after  he  had  read  Mrs.  Hodges'  public  denial,  with 
its  disagreeable  associations  for  all  concerned,  that 
he  answered  Fanny's  note,  excusing  his  acceptance 
of  her  invitation  to  himself  on  the  ground  that  he 
deserved  a  holiday  before  he  began  the  next  lesson. 
Joining  Lindley  as  his  host  passed  through 
Washington,  they  went  on  together  to  Wentwood. 
He  was  not  surprised  when  he  was  told  that  Lucy 
was  there  before  him.  He  had  expected  as  much, 
and  in  his  heart,  so  rebellious  was  his  mood,  he 
had  hoped  as  much.  Sometimes  the  Belmores 
hunted  at  Wentwood,  an  old  plantation  which  had 
descended  to  Fanny  from  her  mother's  side,  and 
again  they  went  there  simply  to  rest.  This  year 
they  would  not  have  gone  at  all  if  a  young  mar- 
ried woman  had  not  had  her  own  idea  of  the 
proper  denouement  for  this  tale  of  four.  There- 
fore,  she  did  not  want  a  rabble  at  the  house; 

257 


Lucy  of  the  Stars 

an  objective  four  plus  a  subjective  two  were  six 
and  just  enough. 

The  key-stone  of  her  plan  was  the  promise  of 
John  Frane  to  follow  them  in  a  few  days.  But  this 
was  to  be  a  secret  from  Geraldine — a  vital,  com- 
manding secret — as  the  plotter  kept  reiterating  to 
Lindley.  Nor  had  she  mentioned  to  John  that 
Geraldine  would  be  at  Wentwood.  She  feared 
that  one  or  the  other  might  retreat  and  she  wanted 
to  bring  them  together  quite  unexpectedly  and 
under  her  own  eye. 

When  Lindley  and  Carniston  arrived  it  was 
nearly  dinner  time,  and  they  found  Fanny  some- 
what worried  about  Geraldine. 

"She  has  been  erratic  to-day,  even  for  her," 
Fanny  explained.  "It  is  almost  rude  the  way  she 
has  deserted  us.  She  came  to  my  room  about 
seven  this  morning  and  said  she  was  going  for  a 
ride.  She  seemed  unusually  preoccupied  and  quiet, 
and  just  a  trifle  moody.  We  haven't  heard  a  word 
from  her  since.  I  have  sent  Hudson  on  to  Smileys' 
— she  might  go  there,  as  she  knows  Mrs.  Smiley — 
to  find  out  if  they  have  seen  her." 

They  were  talking  of  a  general  search  if  no  news 
came  soon,  when  Mather,  the  stableman  from  Smi- 
leys', whom  Hudson,  going  by  a  different  path,  had 
passed  on  the  way,  brought  a  note  from  the  miss- 
ing one. 

258 


Breaking  the  Circuit 

"You  and  Miss  von  Kar  must  have  thought  me 
distraite,  indeed,  to  have  bolted  the  way  I  did  this 
morning.  I  needed  oxygen,  I  think.  I  had  a  fear- 
fully long  ride  and  am  quite  done  up ;  so  I'm  going 
to  remain  the  night  here.  Why  can't  you  come 
over  for  me  in  the  morning?  Mather  will  bring 
your  answer." 

Lucy,  the  one  who  might  have  guessed  the  cause 
of  Geraldine's  astonishing  excursion  at  such  an 
early  hour  after  having  sat  up  so  late  the  night  be- 
fore, was  entirely  innocent  of  any  thought  that  her 
narrative  had  disturbed  Geraldine's  peace  of  mind; 
and,  besides,  she  was  preoccupied  with  her  own 
emotions. 

As  Carniston  looked  into  her  eyes  again  and  she 
looked  into  his,  either  was  asking  the  question, 
"How  has  it  been  with  you  since  we  parted?" 
while  either  saw,  or  thought  he  saw,  that  the  other 
had  grown  older,  or  at  least  grown  weary.  Lucy 
was  thinner  and  paler  and  more  spirituelle,  and  the 
lines  about  Carniston's  mouth  had  hardened  with 
his  first  real  contact  with  that  side  of  the  world 
where  the  furnaces  are  stoked  and  the  money  is 
made.  She  called  him  Arthur  as  of  old,  and  he 
answered  her  with  Lucy.  Thus  easily  again  they 
went  through  the  pantomime  of  two  friends  with 
common  interests  of  fellowship  and  reminiscence. 

No  chance  for  them  to  speak  alone  offered  itself 
259 


Lucy  of  the  Stars 

that  night.  It  came  the  next  morning  without  seek- 
ing, when  the  four  started  to  meet  Geraldine,  and 
the  Belmores,  leading  the  way,  allowed  the  other 
pair  to  fall  behind. 

Their  horses,  with  the  freshness  taken  out  of 
them,  were  at  an  easy  walk  when  Lucy  broke  the 
silence  of  an  uncanny  quarter  of  an  hour,  in  which 
she  was  smiling  all  the  time  and  Carniston,  abashed 
and  conscience-stricken,  could  not  look  her  in  the 
face,  while  both  knew  that  they  would  not  part  till 
they  had  spoken  of  their  secret. 

"Come,"  she  rallied  him,  "come,  Arthur,  it  was 
denied." 

This  sounds  brutal  in  print.  But  there  was 
so  little  of  banter  and  so  much  of  sympathy  in 
her  manner  that  she  seemed  a  fellow-conspirator. 
And  her  smile !  He  had  watched  it  flickering  as  it 
did  with  a  never-care  song.  Here  was  all  her  old 
charm  calling  him  after  the  drudgery  of  the  first 
lesson  and  away  from  the  drudgery  of  lessons  to 
come. 

"Lucy,  if  you  are  going  to  talk  that  way,"  he 
said,  in  genuine  appeal,  "I'll  take  that  fence  and 
gallop  away  to  the  devil.  After  Bender,  I  am  sure 
he  would  be  real,  honest  company.  I  could  at  least 
fight  him  with  my  fists,  and  they  and  a  title  are 
about  all  I  have  for  the  battle." 

"But  tell  me,  was  it  so  hard?"  Lucy  asked. 
260 


Breaking  the  Circuit 

"No,  it  wasn't,  I  am  sure,  with  such  a  handsome 
girl  as  Geraldine." 

She  spoke  impersonally,  and  he  caught  for  the 
first  time  a  suggestion  of  a  change  of  attitude  of 
which  she  was  soon  to  make  him  fully  aware. 

"Hard!  I  did  my  duty!  Geraldine  was  very 
kind.  She  is  fine.  She  helped  to  make  me  ashamed 
of  myself." 

Here  was  one  from  the  home  land,  to  whom  he 
might  speak  unrestrictedly,  to  whom  he  might  ex- 
plain the  routine  of  his  miserable  weeks;  and  while 
she  listened  with  a  sympathy  that  drew  him  on,  he 
told,  not  without  some  sense  of  humour,  of  Ben- 
der's, of  the  sly  hints  of  the  old  ambassador,  of 
some  American  mothers  who  offered  their  daugh- 
ters on  golden  platters,  and  of  other  American 
mothers  who  smiled  at  him  indifferently  as  if  he 
were  a  drummer  come  to  an  overstocked  market. 
Continuing  his  comedy,  which  was  all  tragedy  to 
him,  he  even  related  the  story  of  his  proposal  in 
Lafayette  Square  which  made  him  and  not  the  girl 
ridiculous.  But  he  left  out  the  little  incident  about 
Geraldine  buying  the  paper  and  devouring  the  re- 
turns of  Frane's  election,  which  might  have  given 
Lucy  an  inkling  that  Fanny  and  not  herself  was 
right,  after  all. 

"Her  compliment  about  me  was  delightful," 
Lucy  said,  "although  I  don't  deserve  it.     I  can't 

261 


Lucy  of  the  Stars 


^express  myself.  Nobody  really  can.  I  fear  the 
'world  would  be  one  babble  if  we  could.  Only, 
Geraldine  can  smile  and  win  everybody  and  I  must 
say  something  or  they  will  overlook  me.  But  the 
main  point  for  you  is  her  answer  to  your  question. 
Will  you  tell  me  her  exact  phrase  again?" 

"It  seemed,"  he  said,  after  he  had  repeated  it, 
"as  if,  graciously,  from  her  benign  heights,  she 
was  intimating  that  I  need  not  be  altogether  dis- 
couraged for  she  might  pick  me  up  again,  although 
she  presently  laid  me  aside;  and  I,  a  grandson  of 
the  hunter,  felt  small  and  mean  and  futile." 

"She  did  not  say  'no/  "  Lucy  rejoined.  "She  is 
a  Gothic  girl  and  she  will  be  a  countess  yet.  Yes, 
she  is  a  Gothic  girl,  even  if  she  does  have  a  sense 
of  humour.  Think  of  the  gargoyles;  don't  they 
ever  talk  to  you,  Arthur?  They  were  meant  to 
ward  off  the  devils,  but  they  don't  keep  the  earls 
away." 

"Oh,  Lucy!"  he  expostulated,  suddenly  stricken 
with  the  idea,  "since  I  went  into  bondage  I  seem  to 
have  lost  all  sense  of  propriety.  What  an  enor- 
mity that  I  should  have  told  you  this!" 

"Not  an  enormity  to  tell  it  to  a  friend  and  coun- 
sellor," and  she  spoke  slowly  and  softly,  "a  friend 
and  counsellor,  you  see,  with  special  privileges;  such 
a  friend  as  may  come  only  once  to  a  man — for 
when  the  back  seats  were  empty  and  we  weren't 

262 


Breaking  the  Circuit 

thinking  of  the  cost  of  petrol,  we" — a  long  pause 
— "you  know." 

Was  it  irresistible  for  her  to  test  again  those 
strands  by  which  she  could  tell  whether  or  not 
absence  had  made  the  heart  fonder,  or  had  she 
no  such  author's  or  actor's  thought? 

"Lucy,  if  you  talk  that  way  I  shall  take  wings 
and  fly  with  you  to  the  end  of  the  world,  and  laugh 
at  Wormley,  and  pawn  the  heads  of  the  beasts  that 
the  hunter  killed!" 

Little  did  he,  amiably  removed  by  two  genera- 
tions from  the  hunter,  think  that  this  was  pre- 
cisely what  that  dare-devil  would  have  done. 

"It's  nice  to  contemplate  flying,"  she  said.  "It's 
done  on  the  stage  with  wires;  and  if  you  don't  see 
the  wires,  and  Columbine  is  petite,  it  seems  quite 
real.  But  Columbine  comes  down  to  earth  again, 
and  I'm  sure  she  wouldn't  be  a  Columbine  for  long 
if  she  couldn't  pay  for  her  meals  and  lodging.  She 
flies  for  pay;  only  the  rich  can  afford  to  fly  for 
pleasure.  I  fear,  Arthur,  before  we  had  gone  far 
we  would  find  that  the  tissue  of  our  wings  was 
paper  money;  and  when  the  breeze  of  bills  had 
carried  them  away  we  would  look  at  the  frame- 
work of  sorry  sentiment  and  find  that  it  would  not 
make  cover  for  our  heads,  and  as  kindlings  the  only 
fire  it  would  make  would  be  heart  fires,  which 
don't  keep  the  grate  from  being  cold  on  a  winter's 

263 


Lucy  of  the  Stars 

day.  Then  we  would  look  at  each  other  and  ask, 
'Who  proposed  it  first?'  just  to  shift  personal 
responsibility." 

She  put  back  her  sadness  with  play-actress  buoy- 
ancy as  she  smiled  at  him,  while  he  cast  his  eyes 
down  in  confusion  and  beat  his  boot  with  his 
crop. 

uBut  if  I  have  truly  loved  you,  I  am  truly  your 
friend,"  she  proceeded.  "I  am  trying  to  get  out 
of  self  and  live  for  others.  Mr.  Frane  has  taught 
me  that.  The  fact  that  you  feel  so  mean  for  hav- 
ing to  propose  to  one  girl  so  soon  after  you  agreed 
to  marry  another  shows  that  you  are  really  good 
and  noble.  Let's  bring  my  never-care  philosophy 
to  bear.  It  embraces  science,  which  you  under- 
stand. Can  you  not  see  that  this  illusion  which 
is  called  love  is  produced  by  a  certain  mood  of  the 
mind  which,  being  exposed  opportunely  to  a  cer- 
tain masculine  or  feminine  charm,  seems  to  com- 
plete the  circuit?  You  are  afraid  to  break  the 
current.  But  once  you  do  break  it  another  circuit 
is  soon  made." 

"Not  so  soon,"  said  Carniston,  grimly. 

"Oh,  it  doesn't  come  gradually,"  she  said,  and 
it  was  not  altogether  a  smile  that  made  her  lips 
quiver.  "It  didn't  with  us.  It  is  like  a  flash.  Be- 
sides, you  can't  get  the  new  inspiration  till  you  put 
the  old  aside.     Does  the  average  young  man  say 

264 


Breaking  the  Circuit 

'I  love  that  girl'?  Do  we  believe  in  the  Roman 
oracles  or  in  the  divine  inspiration  of  Joan  of 
Arc?  If  not,  how  can  we  believe  that  this  man 
and  that  woman  were  specially  mated? 

"Suppose  I  had  been  reared  in  Paris  and  had 
never  known  London  at  all.  Would  we  both  have 
gone  through  life  inconsolable  because  we  never 
met?  No.  To-day  their  friends  say  Tom  and 
Mary  will  make  a  good  match;  conditions  of 
wealth,  likes,  and  temper  are  in  their  favor. 
Doesn't  the  law  say  that  marriage  is  a  contract? 
Does  it  contemplate  marriage  as  an  illusion  during 
a  mood?  It's  plain  that  you  can't  make  your  es- 
tate, your  position,  and  your  whole  life  subject  to 
this  whim  of  fate  with  which  story-writers  play  as 
jugglers  play  with  balls.  Have  you  never  tried  to 
reason  that  way?  I  have.  You  see  I  am  a  phil- 
osopher." 

"Yes,  I  have  reasoned  that  way  through  many 
nights,"  he  answered. 

Every  argument  that  she  had  advanced  he  had 
rehearsed  again  and  again ;  and  at  the  moment  when 
he  felt  that  conviction  was  complete  he  always 
heard  another  voice  which  was  not  contentious, 
but  made  a  statement  as  simple  as  that  the  grass 
grows  or  the  sun  shines. 

"But  you  love  Lucy!"  it  would  shout  through 
the  door  at  the  most  inopportune  moment.      If 

265 


Lucy  of  the  Stars 

it  gained  a  hearing  it  was  not  prolix,  for  it  de- 
pended on  the  "current"  rather  than  on  processes 
of  thought.  "Astrology  belonged  to  the  ancients 
and  stocks  and  shares  belong  to  the  moderns,"  it 
said.  "I  am  the  sacred  fire  of  chivalry  which  you 
cannot  quench.  I  gave  strength  to  the  first  man 
who  fought  for  the  mate  of  his  choice." 

"But  you  love  Lucy!"  the  voice  was  saying  to 
him  now. 

"You  see,  it  is  hard  for  me  to  break  the  circuit, 
and  so  I  can't  get  a  fresh  start,"  he  said. 

"I  am  sorry,"  said  Lucy.  But  was  she  really 
sorry?  She  gleaned  in  that  instant  a  little  happi- 
ness out  of  much  bitterness.  It  was  good  to  be 
loved,  though  it  was  folly.  "You  must  think  of 
me  as  grown  very  worldly  and  wise  of  late,"  she 
added.  "You  mustn't  think  you've  broken  my 
heart  or  done  anything  wrong." 

Something  told  him  that  the  change  was  com- 
plete ;  that  for  her  the  current  was  indeed  broken. 
But  for  him  who  has  been  so  matter-of-fact  when 
he  showed  her  his  father's  letter  time  had  only  in- 
creased the  value  of  the  treasure  that  he  had  lost, 
and  he  was  ready  then,  in  the  intoxication  of  her 
nearness,  to  make  the  flight  without  thinking  of 
the  kindling  wood. 

"So  I'm  going  to  help  now.  I'm  not  going  to 
be  rude  and  banter  you  any  more.     It's  all  over. 

266 


Breaking  the  Circuit 

We're  old  friends;  we  understand  each  other,"  she 
concluded. 

"Yes,  it's  all  over,"  he  repeated,  without  look- 
ing up. 

Then  they  came  in  sight  of  Lindley  and  Fanny 
entering  the  Smileys'  gate,  and  their  horses,  being 
near  to  a  habitation,  began  to  trot.  Carniston, 
poor  at  acting,  looked  blue  when  they  arrived. 
But  Lucy  was  chatting  gaily.  Geraldine  observ- 
ing her  concluded  that  she  was,  indeed,  a  play- 
actress  and  began  to  dislike  her. 

"We  weren't  so  much  behindhand,"  Lucy  ex- 
plained. "I  was  telling  Arthur  about  some  letters 
I  had  received  from  mutual  friends  at  home,  and 
we  saw  a  fence  and  wondered  if  we  could  take  it, 
and  we  did." 


267 


XXVI 

FOR  SOMETHING  REAL 

THEY  remained  at  the  Smileys'  only  a  few 
minutes,  and  on  the  ride  back  Lindley  and 
Fanny  again  took  the  lead.  But  Lucy  soon  caught 
up  with  them,  purposely  leaving  Carniston  and 
Geraldine  together. 

The  day  was  fair,  the  road  hard,  and  the  atmos- 
phere of  that  November  dryness  and  clearness 
which  John  Frane  said  had  made  Americans  out 
of  Anglo-Saxons,  Teutons,  and  Latins.  Geral- 
dine was  one  of  the  finished  products  of  America 
and  the  air,  and  she  was  never  so  superb  as  when 
on  horseback.  Carniston  seemed  a  companion 
even  more  in  keeping  with  her  than  when  they  had 
walked  out  toward  Lafayette  Square  on  the  famous 
morning  that  the  final  returns  came  in  one  hundred 
and  eighty  thousand  strong. 

"Do  you  ride  much  at  home?"  she  asked. 

"Some,  in  the  season.  Father  used  to  go  in  for 
it  a  great  deal.  He  was  M.  F.  H.  for  a  long  time. 
I  thought  he  dropped  it  because  he  was  getting 
offish  with  the  world.     The  real  reason,  which  I 

268 


For  Something  Real 

never  knew  until  he  died,  was  that  he  was  too  poor; 
and  while  he  was  making  economies  in  every 
direction  in  order  that  I  might  have  a  handsome 
income,  I  had  been  living  in  a  way  which  I  know 
now  was  not  living  at  all.  He  had  been  very  sweet- 
tempered  and  careless  when  he  was  young,  and 
when  he  was  old  he  made  this  sacrifice  for  me, 
because  his  was  such  a  character  that  he  could 
never  forget  what  it  meant  to  be  young.  The 
sacrifice  was  all  the  more  touching  because  he  loved 
to  sit  in  the  sunlight  and  be  agreeable  to  every- 
body." 

He  spoke  with  a  boyish  frankness  which  had 
its  charm — a  charm  of  something  the  same  sort 
that  his  father  must  have  had  in  youth.  Her  men- 
tion of  Burbridge  had  come  to  him  just  after  his 
glimpse  of  the  Smileys  had  made  him  think  of 
home  and  family  associations.  The  Smileys  were 
Virginians  of  the  old  school,  living  modestly,  sim- 
ply— and  narrowly,  perhaps — and  thinking  more 
of  Fanny's  Southern  family  than  of  Lindley's 
wealth.  Carniston  felt  that  he  could  understand 
the  Smileys  better  than  many  Americans  he  had 
met. 

"And  your  father  gave  it  up  because  of  money, 
and  you  may  lose  the  estate  just  because  of 
money?"  she  asked.     "Just  money?" 

"Just  money!"  he  repeated  cynically, 
269 


Lucy  of  the  Stars 

But  it  was  just  money  to  her.  Her  meaning 
was  the  same  as  if  an  ocean  pilot  had  said,  "just 
air." 

"And  you  in  England,"  she  went  on,  "you  who 
have  all  the  other*things  are  led  directly  into  touch 
with  a  class  of  people  here  who  haven't  the  other 
things  but  have  more  wealth  than  they  know  what 
to  do  with." 

"Yes,  it  does  sometimes  seem  a  waste  of  energy 
the  way  it  is  used."  The  phrase  was  one  of 
Frane's,  but  Carniston  did  not  give  credit,  as  the 
exchange  editors  say,  because  the  plagiarism  was 
unconscious. 

"That  accounts  for  the  bargain,"  Geraldine 
observed. 

She  was  a  little  surprised  at  herself  again  to  find 
how  easy  it  was  for  her  to  talk  to  Carniston.  They 
settled  down  into  a  long  conversation,  and  when 
they  arrived  a  half-hour  after  the  others,  Geral- 
dine did  not  make  the  excuse  that  they  had  been 
taking  a  fence. 

At  the  luncheon  table  she  said  quietly  to  Bel- 
more  that  there  was  some  business  about  which 
her  mother  had  asked  her  to  speak  to  him.  She 
went  later  to  the  upstairs  room  where  he  had  been 
at  work  with  his  secretary  answering  letters  and 
telegrams.    He  looked  up,  kindly  and  curious. 

"You  saw  that  notice  in  the  paper  about  my 
270 


For  Something  Real 

engagement  to  Carniston,"  Geraldine  began.  Her 
eyelids  were  far  apart,  almost  with  the  effect  of 
staring,  as  if  she  were  wondering  at  herself  for 
what  she  was  going  to  say. 

"Yes,  and  happily  saw  it  denied,"  Belmore  re- 
sponded. 

"It  was  announced  a  little  prematurely;  that  is 
all,"  she  pursued,  rigidly.  "You  have  been  the 
guardian  of  our  property  and  the  earl's  estate  is 
poor.  I  should  like  to  know  if  there  is  a  million 
available  to  pay  off  his  debts." 

"Geraldine !  You  !"  This  much  escaped  him. 
It  stung  her,  but  she  gave  no  sign  of  embarrass- 
ment. 

"I  have  thought  hard,  very  hard,"  she  answered. 

"And  you  wish  an  accounting,"  he  resumed;  for 
her  manner  seemed  to  leave  him  no  other  avenue 
of  approach. 

There  were  many  things  that  this  man  of  blood 
and  iron  and  silence  might  have  said.  The  chron- 
icles of  his  family  carried  him  back  to  the  day  when 
Jim  Hodges  confessed  himself  bankrupt.  It  was 
Lindley's  father  who  had  broken  him  in  taking  up 
the  gauntlet  which  Jim  had  thrown  down,  and  Sam 
Belmore,  who  could  be  bitter  and  harsh,  was  dis- 
inclined to  give  quarter.  But  associated  with  them 
was  a  Scotchman  from  Pittsburg,  with  his  senti- 
ment ever  under  canny  control,  who  believed  in 

271 


Lucy  of  the  Stars 

patting  the  world  on  the  back  and  making  it  run 
your  errands.  He  said  that  Jim  knew  things  that 
were  better  left  untold  and  he  might  turn  insur- 
gent; "and,  man,  he's  clever,  and  he'll  make  more 
money  for  us  if  we  give  him  another  start.  He's 
humble  and  willing  now,  too."  So  the  Hodges' 
fortune  was  saved  and  the  friendship  of  the  two 
partners  resumed,  with  the  result  that  only  a  year 
afterwards,  when  a  panic  was  on  the  land  and  the 
doctors  told  Jim  Hodges  that  he  had  not  long  to 
live,  he  left  the  management  of  his  estate,  literally 
then  worth  nothing,  such  was  the  depression  of  the 
market,  to  Sam  Belmore,  who  had  furnished  the 
cash  to  carry  it  over  the  crisis,  and  to  his  son  after 
him,  with  a  prayer  for  Geraldine. 

Lindley  was  thinking  what  the  expenditure  of 
that  fortune  would  mean  in  good  roads,  in  bridges, 
in  parks,  in  schools.  It  would  build  and  endow 
twenty  hospitals.  To  him,  the  man  of  gold,  money 
meant  what  soldiers  mean  to  a  general,  and  he 
foresaw  the  loss  of  a  corps  which  he  had  nursed 
and  trained  and  umade  out  of  clay."  It  was  power 
for  good  taken  out  of  the  land  whose  overflowing 
resources,  answering  to  modern  genius,  were  soon 
to  be  exhausted;  and  it  was  going  because  of  one 
mother  who  had  brought  up  an  only  daughter  to 
be  unhappy.  Such  were  the  actual  thoughts  of 
this  so-called  public  enemy,  who  was  said  to  have 

272 


For  Something  Real 

a  "marble  heart"  because  he  did  not  know  how  to 
give  the  "glad  hand";  that  "glad  hand"  which 
sometimes  has  an  itching  palm. 

Although  it  has  taken  many  lines  to  throw 
light  on  the  character  of  this  type  of  the  second 
generation,  the  summary  of  them  all  flashed 
through  Lindley's  mind  in  that  moment  of  evident 
concentration  on  a  subject  which,  his  business  asso- 
ciates said,  gave  his  judgments  when  they  came  an 
air  of  finality. 

"Why,"  he  asked,  "Geraldine,  why  are  you 
going  to  do  this?"  That  was  as  good  as  saying 
that  he  knew  she  could  not  really  love  the  earl. 
With  him,  love  was  the  controlling  factor  in  that 
social  convention  called  the  marriage  contract;  for 
he  loved  Fanny. 

"If  I  tell  you,  Lin,"  and  she  leaned  toward  him 
earnestly,  "it's  not  because  it's  polite  for  you  to  ask 
that  question,  but  because  you  really  have  a  right 
to  know.  But  you  must  promise  not  to  argue.  I'm 
keyed  up  to  the  tenacity  of  the  winning  stroke  when 
vantage  has  varied  out  and  in  for  five  minutes.  It 
was  so  fortunate  that  Fanny  invited  me  down  here 
where  the  quiet  has  made  me  logical." 

"I'll  not  argue.  I'll  listen.  You  know  that  I 
like  to  listen  best,  and  always  to  you,  Geraldine; 
for  you  are  very  dear  to  Fanny  and  me." 

"Please  don't  hurt  me!"  Then,  as  if  brushing 
273 


Lucy  of  the  Stars 

aside  her  exclamation,  she  proceeded.  "Maybe 
I'm  not  like  what  I  seem,  even  to  you  and  Fanny. 
I  can  lie  awake  for  hours  thinking  about  some  little 
remark  that  I  seemed  scarcely  to  notice  when  I 
heard  it.  People  only  expect  me  to  look  beautiful 
and  smile.  I  am  a  kind  of  hothouse  plant;  that  is 
why  they  named  me  Geraldine.  If  only  I  might 
have  been  Mollie  or  Kate  or  something  simple ! 
One  thing  you  mustn't  do — you  mustn't  think  that 
I  don't  understand  things  a  little,  even  if  it  is  so 
hard  for  me  to  say  what  I  mean.  I  did  love  father. 
You  know,  I  feel  as  if  I  could  have  done  his  cook- 
ing and  washing,  as  mother  did  once,  and  feel  hap- 
pier than  I  do  to-day.  He  was  so  real — and  we 
used  to  make  him  so  uncomfortable  at  times.  If 
I  had  him  now — I'm  older,  I'm  a  woman  quite, 
am  I  not? — I'd  parade  him  proudly,  as  much  as 
to  say,  I  am  his  daughter — I,  I! — the  daughter 
of  this  great,  strong  man,  and  he  says  I  help  him 
to  do  something  real — I  like  that  word  real  best 
of  all,  don't  you  ? 

"But  father  went  so  long  ago  that  I  couldn't 
even  give  him  a  good-bye  smile  which  would  make 
him  understand  that  all  I  wanted  was  to  be  a  good 
girl  and  make  him  happy.  I  do  remember  he  did 
say  once,  when  I  was  holding  his  thumb  in  my 
little  hand — and  what  fine,  big,  strong  hands 
father    had! — 'Be    patient    with    your    mother. 

274 


For  Something  Real 

When  she  scolds  me  because  my  manners  are  bad 
it's  because  she's  so  miserable.  If  you  could  only 
have  known  her  when  I  knew  her  first  and  she 
helped  me — before  the  boy  died  and  before  you  had 
come  at  all !  I  can  never  forget  that,  and  you  please 
try  to  remember  for  me.' 

"Well,  Lin,  I've  remembered  and  I've  been  pa- 
tient, though  I  did  break  out  sometimes.  Then  I 
was  a  little  ashamed  of  myself.  But  I  wouldn't 
let  the  world  know  that  I  was — no,  not  for  any- 
thing. I  suppose  that's  my  father's  pride.  Any- 
way, you  can  see  what  a  lot  I've  thought  about 
things,  haven't  I?" 

He  nodded  sadly,  listening  and  thinking.  He 
was  wondering  if  her  refusal  of  John  did  not  hark 
back  to  her  father's  dislike  of  him;  if  the  true 
nature  of  her  depths  were  not  as  yet  unsounded 
even  by  Fanny. 

"But  it  has  not  been  real  since  father  died.  It  has 
all  been  like  a  play  when  we  were  with  others; 
and  when  we  weren't,  it  has  been  like  a  play  when 
you  go  behind  the  scenes  after  the  last  act.  I  like 
something  real.  You  and  Fanny  and  John  and 
that  little  German  girl — you  are  so  real.  Carnis- 
ton  is  real.  When  I  see  you  I  always  feel  that 
there  is  something  missing,  something  that  I  want. 
You  understand.  I've  noticed  it  when  I  saw 
Fanny  and  mother  together — although  you  are  so 

275 


Lucy  of  the  Stars 


kind — as  if — as  if  we  weren't  exactly  in  your 
world." 

"No,  Geraldine!  Not  that!  Never,  never!" 
Lindley  said.  "We  never  thought  of  it.  I  suppose 
it's  your  imagination  or  our  preoccupation  with 
our  own  affairs.  You  are  in  Washington;  we  are 
in  New  York.  Your  mother  likes  society  and  we 
do  not." 

"You  are  the  soul  of  kindness,  and  it's  my  fault 
if  you  don't  understand.  I  see  so  much  and  don't 
know  how  to  describe  it.  Remember,  you  prom- 
ised not  to  argue.  I  came  to  you  to  say  that  I  have 
something  to  exchange  for  something  that  will 
make  mother  happy,  for  something  that  will  make 
me  patient,  which  is  the  thing  father  wanted.  Over 
there  it  is  real,  at  least.  Over  there  the  path  lies 
plain,  with  no  false  efforts,  and  you  live  as  you 
please,  because  that  is  the  privilege  of  position 
assured.  If  half  of  the  fortune  is  mine  I  want  it, 
and  to  leave  half  to  mother,  as  I'm  sure  that  father 
would  want  me  to." 

It  was  at  his  tongue's  end  to  make  an  appeal  for 
John,  explaining  the  part  he  had  played  the  night 
he  sent  John  on  his  quixotic  journey  to  Washing- 
ton. But  he  recalled  his  promise  to  Fanny  not  to 
meddle. 

"There's  enough  and  more,"  he  said.  "It  is 
between  five  and  six  millions.    I'll  be  glad  to  turn 

276 


For  Something  Real 

over  everything  to  you  and  Carniston  at  any  time. 
As  you  have  a  man  in  the  family  now,  that  would 
be  better,  I  should  say." 

"Very  well."  She  was  the  old  Geraldine  again, 
undisturbed. 

"And,  Geraldine,"  he  added  suddenly,  in  view 
of  Fanny's  plans  and  John's  unannounced  arrival 
on  the  morrow,  "the  engagement  is  not  to  be  given 
out  to-night  at  the  table  or  anything  like  that.  I 
mean,  it's  just  dressing-time,  and  it  would  come  as 
a  shock  all  round  and  be  somewhat  awkward." 

"No,  we'll  not  announce  it  till  it's  convenient 
for  you  to  go  to  mother  with  me.  That's  under- 
stood with  the  earl.  We'll  do  it  all  quite  regularly 
this  time.     There'll  be  no  denial." 

She  was  serene  as  she  went  out  of  the  door. 

Instantly  she  was  gone  he  hastened  to  Fanny,  at 
first  giving  her  a  brief  of  the  situation  as  he  would 
have  given  to  a  man  of  affairs.  But  she  demanded, 
as  he  would  have  done  in  a  serious  matter  where  he 
was  an  expert,  a  detailed  statement. 

"We  must  plan!  We  must  plan!"  she  said. 
"We  must  clear  out  and  leave  the  house  to  them 
— and  if  John  only  talks !  I  have  it !  Geraldine 
must  meet  him  at  the  station." 

"Hardly  practicable,"  he  said.  "It's  the  eight 
A.  M.  at  Wayne  Junction.  Would  you  ask  her  to 
go  alone  to  meet  him  at  that  hour?" 

277 


Lucy  of  the  Stars 

"Oh,  she  wouldn't  know  he  was  coming.  She 
must  meet  him  by  surprise." 

"How?"  he  asked,  helplessly. 

"I  don't  know.  I  am  thinking.  Why  do  you 
suppose  I  am  holding  my  fingers  to  my  temples  in 
this  way,  you  goose?" 

"It  seems  to  me,"  he  said  determinedly,  "that 
the  thing  is  for  you  to  go  and  plead  with  her 
as  only  you  can,  Fanny.  It  was  all  I  could  do  to 
keep  from  telling  her  that  it  was  all  a  hoax  about 
the  disinheritance  and — and  shaking  her  back  to 
reason." 

"Thank  heaven  you  didn't!  Argue  with  Geral- 
dine  now !  It  would  only  stiffen  her.  All  I  ask  of 
you,  Lin,  is  to  keep  still,  to  agree  to  any  plan  I 
suggest.  It  all  depends  on  them,  now.  Oh,  I 
can't  express  it,  but  you  ought  to  know !  If  John 
talks — if  she  really  does  love  him!  I'm  not  so 
sure  she  does.  But  I  do  know  that  to-morrow  is 
the  last  chance." 


278 


XXVII 

A  FREE  DAY  IN  THE  COUNTRY 

I  TOLD  you  that  I  had  invited  Amy  Standish 
on  from  Pittsburg,  didn't  I?"  Fanny  had 
dropped  into  Geraldine's  room  for  a  minute  at 
bedtime.  "No?  Well,  no  matter.  I  have  just 
had  a  telegram  from  her  saying  that  she  will 
arrive  at  eight  o'clock  in  the  morning  at  Wayne 
Junction.  I  wonder  if  you  would  mind  having 
coffee  and  toast  at  half-past  seven  and  going  in 
the  car  with  Lin  and  me  to  meet  her,  and  all  break- 
fasting together  when  we  return.  Naturally,  Lucy 
— devoted  little  thing! — is  going  to  sit  up  late 
writing  a  long  letter  to  her  father  and  so  she  will 
want  to  sleep  late." 

Of  course  Geraldine  agreed.  Fanny  had  given 
herself  no  fears  on  this  feature  of  her  plan  which, 
generally  speaking,  as  an  old  general  would  have 
told  her,  was  dangerously  complex  for  actual  field 
conditions.  To  complete  the  assurance  that  Lucy 
would  not  awake  early,  she  went  to  Lucy's  room 
and  there  chatted  till  midnight,  and  then  told  her 
that  if  she  would  leave  her  letter  outside  of  her 

279 


Lucy  of  the  Stars 

door  one  of  the  servants  who  had  to  go  early  to  the 
Junction  would  post  it  for  her. 

When  Geraldine  came  downstairs  the  next  morn- 
ing Fanny's  maid  brought  word  that  her  mistress 
had  a  headache,  and  wouldn't  Geraldine  and  Lin 
please  go  on  without  her? 

"Mr.  Belmore  was  down  half  an  hour  ago," 
Hudson,  who  brought  the  coffee,  explained.  "He 
didn't  sleep  very  well  and  he's  out  walking  in  the 
grounds." 

Geraldine  wondered  if  her  affairs  had  kept  him 
awake.  Meanwhile,  she  kept  glancing  at  the  clock. 
When  she  asked  Hudson  to  tell  Mr.  Belmore  that 
it  was  time  to  start,  he  went  out  by  way  of  the  hall 
and  returned  directly  through  the  kitchen  in  the 
manner  of  a  servant  making  an  apology. 

"I'm  so  sorry,  Miss,  I  made  a  mistake.  It  was 
the  cook  who  told  me,  and  what  the  cook  meant 
to  say  was  that  Mr.  Belmore  had  ordered  coffee 
for  seven-twenty,  and  he's  overslept  and  I'm  just 
going  to  wake  him." 

"Don't,"  she  said;  "there  won't  be  time.  He 
needs  rest.  That  is  why  he  comes  to  the  country. 
Let  him  sleep,  please,  and  tell  him  when  he  wakes 
that  I  have  gone  alone." 

Hudson  was  unctuously  prompt  in  acceding  to 
her  wishes.  She  was  hurrying  into  her  wraps  when 
it  occurred  to  her  that  Lucy  might  be  up,  and  if 

280 


A   Free  Day  in  the  Country 

so  she  would  have  just  time  for  coffee  and  to  slip 
into  a  jacket;  but  Hudson  was  unmistakably  ready 
in  his  answer  to  this  suggestion. 

"She  particularly  said  she  was  to  be  waked  on 
no  account  before  eight-thirty." 

Having  broken  away  from  the  academic  com- 
mandment, Fanny  had  invented  with  a  freedom 
that  made  her  offence  brilliant.  As  for  the  head- 
ache, she  was  quite  free  from  it  for  the  first  time 
in  twelve  hours  when  she  had  the  proof  that  the 
servants  had  each  played  his  part  without  arousing 
suspicion,  and  she  and  Lindley  from  her  bedroom 
window  saw  Geraldine  departing  in  the  car. 

"Fanny,  you're  a  genius!  You're  a  wonder!" 
said  Lindley.  "I  felt  sure  that  some  of  them  would 
blunder." 

"Now  if  John  only  talks!"  she  said. 

"And  he  must,"  he  rejoined,  "for  Geraldine 
can't." 

On  the  way  to  the  station  Geraldine  concluded 
that  she  would  be  dutiful  enough  in  marrying  Car- 
niston  without  further  gratifying  her  mother's  am- 
bition by  having  her  trousseau  made  into  Sunday 
supplements.    Yes,  it  must  be  a  quiet  wedding. 

As  the  train  drew  in  she  was  looking  for  Amy 
Standish,  of  Pittsburg,  when  she  saw  the  unmis- 
takable, energetic  person  of  John  Frane  among 
the  half-dozen  people  who  alighted.     His  nostrils 

281 


Lucy  of  the  Stars 

were  sniffing  not  battle  this  time,  but  the  first 
breath  of  the  morning  air  of  a  free  day  in  the  coun- 
try; his  mind  was  not  distracted  with  affairs  five 
hundred  miles  away  but  concentrated  on  play  with 
all  the  zest  it  ever  gave  to  work.  The  girl  on  the 
platform  was  as  fresh  as  the  November  morning. 
When  his  eyes  met  hers  they  sent  a  message  of 
delighted  surprise  as  deep  and  honest  as  his  heart, 
while  his  face  glowed  with  happiness  which  was 
infectious,  irresistible.  She  was  glad  to  see  him; 
her  heart  sang  to  her  that  she  was. 

"John,  you're  looking  splendid!  You  seem  to 
thrive  on  it,  this  politics,"  she  said. 

"We  won,  Geraldine !  I  suppose  one  does  feel 
a  little  better  than  when  he  loses,"  he  answered 
happily. 

"Isn't  Amy  Standish  on  the  train?"  she  asked. 

"Amy  Standish?  Oh,  yes,  I  remember  I  met 
her  once  with  Fanny."  He  never  forgot  a  face 
and  rarely  a  name.  "No,  I  didn't  see  her.  I'm 
sure  she  isn't." 

She  was  not,  for  the  good  reason  that  she  had 
never  been  invited  to  Wentwood. 

"We  thought  that  she  was  coming,  too."  Geral- 
dine did  not  wonder  why  she  put  in  that  "too"  or 
why  she  did  not  tell  him  that  she  did  not  know  he 
was  expected.  "Fanny  has  a  headache  and  Lin 
overslept,  or  they  would  be  here,"  she  explained. 

282 


A  Free  Day  in  the  Country 

"But  you  were  up  and  you  came.  You  are  al- 
ways a  good  soldier  and  a  prompt  one,"  he  said 
as  he  helped  her  into  the  car.  When  they  were 
seated  he  turned  to  her  smiling,  his  enthusiasm  and 
magnetism  in  full  play.  "We've  had  a  great  time, 
Geraldine,  a  great  time  since  I  saw  you.  It  was  a 
good  fight,  and  there's  nothing  in  the  world  like 
that." 

"It's  all  in  all  to  you,"  she  thought. 

"I'd  like  to  tell  you  about  it,  but  I  don't  know 
just  where  to  begin.     Have  you  read  anything?" 

She  was  cut  cruelly  by  his  question,  which  was 
to  her  only  another  way  of  intimating  that  she 
could  not  understand  his  work;  but  she  did  not 
remonstrate. 

"The  Philadelphia  papers  and  the  Pittsburg 
papers  and  the  Kearn's  Ford  paper — every  one 
for  you  and  against  you  that  I  could  get,"  she 
answered,  as  literally  as  if  she  were  on  the  witness 
stand. 

"You  did  this  for  me!" — and  while  he  had 
thought  that  she  was  only  riding  and  dressing  and 
dining  and  thinking  of  any  one  but  him.  He  had 
gone  through  the  campaign  without  the  sympathy 
he  most  needed,  when  it  was  overflowing  in  silence. 
"You  did  all  this  for  me!"  he  repeated. 

"Yes,"  she  answered,  still  literally. 

"I  don't  understand — I — "  The  presence  of 
283 


Lucy  of  the  Stars 

the  chauffeur  made  him  change  his  sentence.  "Oh, 
I  wish  you  could  have  been  there  the  night  of  the 
speech!  I  believe  you'd  have  found  that  worth 
while,  and  the  night  the  returns  came  in,  too.  Who 
do  you  think  were  truly  the  happiest  of  all  Kearn's 
Ford  because  I  had  won  ?  Why,  Jim  and  our  good 
old  Boniface  Binns  across  the  street. 

"You  remember  Dr.  von  Kar  and  Lucy?"  he 
went  on  incoherently,  unable  to  say  the  thing  he 
wanted  to  say.  "They  became  positively  factious 
for  our  side.  I  like  that  little  girl.  I  like  her  and 
I  think  that  something  is  breaking  her  heart." 
But  he  stopped  himself  in  time  from  associating 
Lucy  with  Carniston;  for  he  had  no  right  to  con- 
nect her  with  conjectures  and,  he  added  to  Geral- 
dine,  it  would  never  do  to  repeat  his  vagaries. 
"The  old  doctor  quoted  Latin  to  me  the  night  of 
the  victory.  Illustrations  from  the  ancient  urban 
republic  are  so  applicable  to  modern  continental 
America !" 

"What  was  your  first  thought  when  you  won?" 
she  asked  tentatively,  wondering  if  it  were  not  a 
woman's  silly  question. 

"That  we  had  won — our  side.  Then,  how  I 
must  keep  myself  in  hand,  and  how,  after  all,  we 
had  only  had  the  shout  and  cheer  of  sending  the 
army  forth ;  or  at  best  we  had  only  taken  the  outer 
works,    and  before   us   lay  the   long  siege,   with 

284 


A   Free  Day  in  the  Country 

steady  firing  and  little  theatricalism,  and  by-and- 
by,  probably,  unpopularity.  Then  I  thought " 

But  there  was  the  chauffeur.  On  other  occa- 
sions and  to  other  pairs  who  had  been  in  the  back 
seats,  the  leather  cap  of  this  monster  had  seemed 
like  a  gigantic  hobgoblin  ear  set  with  a  row  of 
eyes. 

"Then  I  thought — I  was  selfish  then — I  thought 
what  it  meant  to  me  personally — I " 

But  here  they  were,  looking  at  the  back  of  a 
leather  coat  when  he  had  only  one  free  day,  and 
going  straight  on  to  Wentwood  where  they  would 
be  with  other  people  till  he  had  to  return.  Wherein 
lay  Fanny's  cunning?  Did  she  not  know  that  the 
chauffeur  could  see  and  hear?  The  pair  in  the 
back  seats  had  no  idea  that  he  had  his  eyes  on  a 
certain  tree,  nor  had  they  any  reason  to  think  that 
he  had  a  map  in  his  pocket;  for,  as  everybody 
knows,  modern  strategy  requires  security  of  infor- 
mation and  an  immensity  of  detail  which  takes  all 
the  romance  out  of  the  work. 

"And  what  did  you  think  for  yourself — for  you 
alone  are  the  first  premise  with  all  your  friends?" 
Geraldine  asked. 

"Oh,  I'm  not  the  first  premise !  I'm  the  instru- 
ment, Geraldine,  so  far  as  the  politics  go,  but" — 
the  car  stopped  beside  the  tree  and  the  monster 
in  leather  shook  his  head  savagely.    When  he  had 

285 


Lucy  of  the  Stars 

crawled  under  the  machine  they  heard  him  speak 
a  word  which  was  in  keeping  with  the  language 
of  monsters  and  which  is  supposed  to  be  the  per- 
manent abiding-place  of  some  of  them. 

"That  lobster  Jones,  he's  changed  on  me! 
Broke  square  in  two !  Well !  of  all  the — "  It  was 
marvellous  that  a  chauffeur  who  was  so  literal  in 
following  instructions  on  a  map  should  have  the 
imagination  to  act  so  well.  But  Fanny  had  had 
perfect  confidence  in  this  particular  subordinate 
from  the  first.  When  he  touched  his  finger  to  that 
hobgoblin  ear  the  pair  in  the  back  seats  saw  that  it 
was  only  a  leather  cap,  after  all. 

"Busted!"  he  observed,  cynically. 

"Flow  far  is  it  to  the  house?"  John  asked. 

"Two  miles." 

They  had  often  walked  two  miles  before  in  their 
lives,  John  remarked  to  Geraldine,  and  they 
started  out  together  over  that  road  where,  the  day 
before,  Lucy  had  tried  to  hasten  the  inevitable  and 
to  do  right,  regardless  of  her  ghosts,  and  Geral- 
dine and  Carniston  had,  with  the  indirection  that 
suited  the  occasion,  made  the  bargain  for  what 
Bender  would  have  called  "the  flight  of  another 
heart  abroad." 

"Geraldine,  you  asked  me  a  question  which  I 
couldn't  answer  on  account  of  a  third  person  being 
present,"  said  John,  when  they  were  out  of  hear- 

286 


A   Free  Day  in  the  Country 

ing  of  the  chauffeur.  "I  have  much  to  say  to  you, 
and  to  begin  at  the  beginning,  there  was  a  night 
when  I  lifted  a  load  off  my  shoulders  by  making 
a  speech  which  was  the  turning-point  of  my  career. 
They  say  to-day  that  it  was  good  politics.  They 
say  that  always  when  you  go  straight  for  the  mark 
and  it  happens  that  the  bull's-eye  rings  the  gong 
of  popularity.  The  load  I  would  lift  now  is  off 
my  heart,  so  that  the  way  for  my  affections  will 
be  as  free  and  clear  as  my  future  career  of  use- 
fulness. 

"After  the  election,  when  I  had  time  to  think  of 
myself,  it  came  overwhelmingly  to  me — this  self- 
ish part.  Once  I  tried  to  speak  to  you,  but  the 
way  I  spoke  was  false  and  wavering.  I  was  mak- 
ing a  deal  between  my  heart  and  my  pride  then, 
not  between  principles  and  a  boss.  This  time  I 
will  tell  you  everything.  I  will  tell  you  that  of 
all  the  congratulations  I  received  I  looked  for- 
ward most  keenly  to  the  one  from  you.  You  said 
'Splendid,  splendid,  splendid,  chums.'  That 
sounded  like  a  dinner-table  compliment.  The 
'chums'  was  graceful;  the  'splendid'  meant  the 
nature  of  the  victory.  But  there  was  nothing 
from  you — you — the  you  revealed  to  me  this 
morning." 

Yes,  Fanny,  he  was  talking  now,  and  talking  in 
the  way  of  a  soldier  who  lays  his  heart  bare  and 

287 


Lucy  of  the  Stars 


in  his  power  and  resource  backs  the  campaign  on 
one  line. 

"This  telegram  seemed  a  title  for  the  picture  you 
made  that  morning  at  breakfast.  The  'splendid' 
was  the  impression  you  made  on  the  world;  the 
'chums,'  a  reminiscence.  It  did  not  seem  to  me 
that  this  could  be  really  you,  but  the  picture  and 
the  evidence  said  so.  Still,  it  made  no  difference. 
I  was  speaking  to  you  that  night  that  I  confessed 
to  a  deal  with  the  boss.  You  inspired  me  to  come 
out  straight  with  the  truth.  I  had  a  flash  of  you 
as  you  looked  that  day  when  you  were  capsized. 
I  saw  you,  not  doubting,  not  fearing,  and  ready 
for  the  worst,  smiling.  I  thought  that  I,  too, 
ought  not  to  be  afraid  of  the  worst.  I  was  winning 
for  you  in  the  same  way  the  night  the  returns 
came  in. 

"I  remember  that  after  the  speech,  when  I 
walked  home  with  the  little  German  girl,  full  of 
my  own  ideas  to  the  exclusion  of  other  people's, 
as  I  frequently  am,  and  expecting  everybody  to 
listen  to  me,  I  was  talking  to  you;  and  when  we 
reached  the  lamp  at  the  Belmores'  gate  I  saw  her 
surprise  at  the  sudden  change  of  my  expression. 
And  the  night  we  won — then,  again,  I  wanted  to 
talk  to  you,  for  no  other  reason  than  that  you  are 
you.  That  is  the  whole  thing  and  the  great  thing. 
I  haven't  any  money,  and  I  would  take  yours  away; 

288 


A  Free  Day  in  the  Country 

and  I  tell  you  what  is  in  my  heart,  for  I  can't  help 
telling  you." 

She  turned  to  him  as  both  stopped;  her  lips  were 
quivering  and  her  lashes  were  wet. 

"John,  I — I" — and  she  swayed  a  little,  though 
her  strong  will  was  still  in  control — "John,  is  it 
all  true?  I  mean,  is  it  true  to  you? — for  that  is 
enough  for  me.  I  am  so  stupid — it  does  not  seem 
that  I  could  mean  so  much  to  anybody.  Do  I — 
do  I?" 

There  was  a  mighty  demand  for  truth  in  her 
eyes. 

"I  swear  •"  He  clasped  both  her  hands  in  his. 
"No,  you  are  not  stupid.  You  are  fine,  which  is 
better  than  being  clever.  You  have  the  art  of 
action  and  comprehension  and  not  the  art  of  chat, 
which  is  sometimes  the  art  of  little  feeling  and 
little  doing.  The  thing  that  is  in  you  and  your 
heart  would  pass  to  me  in  a  glance  of  your  eyes 
if  we  were  in  the  same  room  among  a  thousand 
people.  You  can  go  through  to  the  end  of  the 
path  you  choose  without  hesitation  at  the  cross- 
roads. My  hope  has  always  been  that  ours  should 
be  the  same  path.  I  swear!  But  I  am  so  poor 
and  you  are  so  splendid,  and  you  ought  to  have  the 
luxuries  to  which  you  were  bred." 

She  was  all  quiet  happiness  now,  smiling 
through  her  tears, 

289 


Lucy  of  the  Stars 

"Just  money,"  she  said.  "I  don't  know  as  I 
could  do  the  washing,  but  I  could  iron.  Yes, 
John,  I  can  iron  beautifully.  Just  money !  What 
is  it?  Who  cares?  The  world  is  full  of  people 
who  are  trying  to  use  it  as  balm  for  broken  hearts 
and  only  irritating  their  wounds.  Foreigners  care 
when  they  have  vast  ancestral  estates;  we  aren't 
troubled  that  way,  are  we,  John?  Besides,  my 
friends  tell  me  I  look  better  in  simple  gowns.  I 
don't  think  I  should  ever  look  badly,  should  I?" 

There  was  here  a  womanly  touch  of  pride  in 
bringing  him  something  of  whose  value  her 
mirror  had  often  told  her. 

"Anything  to  help  you  and  be  near  you  always," 
she  said,  giving  herself  to  him. 

After  that  first  moment  when  they  fully  under- 
stood each  other  she  confessed  about  Carniston; 
Then  the  monster  in  leather  came  bringing  the 
car  up  cautiously  over  the  hill  to  see  if  the  coast 
were  clear.  John  beckoned  him  so  mirthfully  that 
he  approached  at  good  speed. 

"I've  fixed  it  all  right,"  he  explained. 

"I  am  glad,"  said  John,  "because  I  am  going  to 
borrow  it,  if  you  will  join  me,  Geraldine.  It's  our 
holiday,  and  we  can  get  a  second  breakfast  at  that 
little  hotel  at  Boone." 

She  agreed  instantly.  Then  she  wrote  a  note 
to    Fanny,    explaining   the    unimportance    of    an 

290 


A   Free  Day  in  the   Country 

automobile  compared  with  a  free  day  in  the 
country  to  two  of  its  owner's  friends.  She  did  not 
write  to  Carniston,  for  she  had  forgotten  him  im- 
mediately it  was  decided  not  to  return  to  the  house, 
and  the  awkward  situation  of  their  meeting  was 
out  of  the  way. 

When  he  was  convinced  that  Geraldine  knew 
how  to  run  the  machine — John  usually  rode  on 
street  cars — the  proud  workman  turned  it  over  to 
them,  with  many  admonitions,  and,  bearing  the 
note,  started  along  the  road,  only  to  turn  after  he 
had  gone  a  few  yards  and  say  triumphantly : 

"It  wasn't  busted,  after  all." 

"We're  so  glad  you  thought  it  was,  and  so  glad, 
too,  that  you  found  you  had  made  a  mistake,"  John 
answered,  laughing. 

At  that  the  monster  in  leather  muttered  to  him- 
self that  he  guessed  they  had  made  their  repairs 
all  right,  too. 

They  turned  the  automobile  about,  and  with  the 
back  seats  empty  they  sought  the  hotel  at  Boone, 
as  Lucy  and  Carniston  in  a  motor  car  had  once 
sought  an  inn  when  they  had  had  a  free  day  in  the 
country  on  the  way  to  Burbridge.  The  map  of 
Virginia  and  Maryland  was  their  plaything  till 
they  rode  into  Washington  at  dusk,  where  they 
dined  together.  She  made  him  take  the  nine 
o'clock  train  to   Pittsburg  to  keep   the  engage- 

291 


Lucy  of  the  Stars 

ment  he  had  made ;  for  she  must  never  be  allowed 
to  interfere  with  his  work.  She  promised  that  she 
would  come  to  Kearn's  Ford  as  soon  as  Fanny 
returned,  and  in  the  home  town — their  town — they 
would  be  married  "soon — very  soon."  At  the 
station  he  alighted  just  outside  the  glare  of  the 
lamps.  He  kissed  her  good-night,  and  she  went 
back  to  her  own  house  feeling  very  patient  with 
her  mother,  and  conscience-free  so  far  as  the  break- 
ing of  a  certain  nobleman's  heart  was  concerned. 

"If  you  are  only  good  to  the  world  it  is  so  good 
to  you,"  John  murmured  before  he  fell  asleep. 
"The  joy  of  living!  the  joy  of  living!" 

Geraldine,  though  she  gave  her  thought  no 
words,  was  thinking  the  same  that  night. 


292 


XXVIII 

A    GOVERNOR-£LECT 

JOHN  talked  this  time,"  Fanny  said,  as  she 
passed  the  note  that  the  chauffeur  had 
brought  across  the  table  to  Lindley  at  breakfast. 
Lucy  was  present,  but  Carniston  was  outside  pac- 
ing the  porch  as  he  smoked  a  cigarette. 

"You  were  right;  you  always  are,"  Lindley  an- 
swered; while  Lucy  could  not  help  observing  from 
their  manner  that  the  news  was  vital  to  both. 

"I  simply  can't  sit  this  breakfast  through  with- 
out shouting!"  Fanny  exclaimed,  as  the  few  lines 
became  more  comprehensible.  "You're  already  as 
good  as  in  the  family,  Lucy.  I'm  sure  you  would 
like  to  know  that  at  this  moment  two  people  are 
dwelling  in  the  clouds  of  the  greatest  happiness 
of  the  world,  all  glorious  and  new-found  to  them." 

The  note  was  passed  to  Lucy,  who  read  it,  filling 
in  with  imagination  the  lapses  between  Fanny's 
series  of  explanatory  exclamations. 

"Isn't  it  like  John!"  Fanny  said.  "There  al- 
ways was  that  irrepressible  mischief  and  dash  in 
him.     Think  of  it,  you  prosy  old  married  man, 

293 


Lucy  of  the  Stars 

Lin!  Oh,  think  of  it,  everybody  in  this  bill- 
paying,  debt-collecting,  dressmakery,  convention- 
riveted  world — here  are  John  and  Geraldine  in  an 
automobile  with  the  back  seats  empty !" 

uThe  back  seats  empty!"  Lucy  gasped,  abstract- 
edly. She  knew  what  that  meant.  Unconquerable 
memories  arose,  but  she  stifled  them  by  joining  in 
Fanny's  happiness.  "With  the  back  seats  empty," 
she  continued,  aand — and  oh,  there  are  enough 
roads  even  if  the  petrol  does  run  out — and  it 
doesn't  when  you  are  rich." 

"Yes,  and  I  didn't  tell  you  all.  I  didn't  tell  you 
that  as  they  fly  they  think  that  she  has  lost  her 
fortune." 

"Her  fortune!  Miss  Hodges — how?"  Lucy 
asked. 

"That's  the  glorious  part  of  it,"  Fanny  added, 
after  she  had  explained  the  deceit  that  Lindley  had 
practised  on  John.  "Think  of  the  gameness  of 
Geraldine,  reared  in  luxury  and  so  used  to  it  in 
every  way.  Because  you  and  I  couldn't  have 
done  that  ourselves,  Lin,  we  admire  it  the  more 
in  others." 

"They  took  each  other  and  they  didn't  care! 
They  said  they'd  bend  the  old  world's  wrinkles 
into  smiles!  Both — both  did  that ?"  Lucy  looked 
from  Fanny  to  Lindley  and  back  again  a  little 
wildly.     "I  love  them  both!"  she  added. 

294 


A  Governor-  Elect 

Geraldine  with  her  wealth  and  beauty,  whom 
fate  seemed  to  have  sent  across  Carniston's  path, 
was  now  out  of  the  way.  The  next  girl  whom  he 
courted  might  not  make  duty  so  attractive.  Was 
Lucy  glad  on  this  account?  Was  she  glad  at  all, 
except  to  find  that  the  felicity  which  was  denied 
to  her  might  be  enjoyed  by  others  ? 

"Now  you  admit  that  she  is  not  a  Gothic  girl," 
Fanny  said,  triumphantly,  "our  Geraldine  I" 

"No.  She's  Spartan  or  early  Roman,  with  the 
charm  of  modernity,  and  I  am  glad — glad.  It's 
so  beautiful;  it's  so  good  that  some  one  had  the 
courage  and  would  not  turn  back." 

At  this  point  Carniston  entered,  and,  looking 
from  one  to  the  other,  he  was  conscious  that  his 
coming  was  coincident  with  the  close  of  a  conver- 
sation in  which  he  was  not  expected  to  share. 

"Another  fine  day.  I  begin  to  believe  in  your 
climate,"  he  said,  as  he  seated  himself  rather  help- 
lessly. As  he  looked  across  at  Lucy  his  colour 
heightened  and  her  eyes  sought  her  plate.  He 
had  been  telling  himself,  too,  that  the  wedding 
should  be  quiet;  and  once  he  was  settled  in  Bur- 
bridge  his  laboratory  and  the  responsibilities  of 
his  position  would  dull  his  feelings  on  a  score 
where,  if  he  were  a  rational  man,  he  would  have 
none  at  all  or  at  least  be  able  to  control  them. 

Lucy's  tongue  was  stricken;  Carniston  spoke 
295 


Lucy  of  the  Stars 

about  the  weather  again,  and  in  the  depression 
which  came  with  his  presence  Fanny  realised  for 
the  first  time  that  strategy  is  tiring  both  to  mind 
and  nerves.  She  and  Lindley  had  been  up  most 
of  the  night.  He  had  made  the  map  and  coached 
the  chauffeur,  while  she  coached  the  servants. 

"Miss  Hodges  not  down  yet?"  asked  Carniston, 
trying  again. 

"She  had  to  go  into  Washington  on  a  sudden 
call,"  Fanny  explained.  "We're  expecting  her 
this  evening" ;  and  she  was  curious  as  to  Geraldine's 
method  of  breaking  the  news  and  its  effect  on  him. 

When  they  rode  to  Smileys'  and  back  again  to 
pass  away  as  best  they  could  that  day  which  went 
on  wings  of  joy  for  John  and  Geraldine,  she  tried 
in  vain  to  throw  Lucy  and  Carniston  together. 
Lucy  was  unusually  gay  and  Carniston  correspond- 
ingly quiet.  A  telephone  message  after  dinner 
from  Geraldine  informed  them,  with  excuses,  that 
a  borrowed  automobile  was  in  the  Hodges'  garage. 

"Yes,  we  lost  a  machine  and  you  found  your- 
self," Fanny  answered.  "Who  is  going  to  tell 
the  earl?" 

"I'll  write  him  a  note  to-morrow.  I'm  too 
happy  to  write  to  anybody  to-night,  unless  it  is 
John" ;  and  there  Geraldine  hung  up  the  receiver. 

As  she  sat  opposite  Carniston  at  the  card-table 
that  night,  Fanny  was  reminded  of  games  on  the 

296 


A  Governor-Elect 

stage  where  one  of  the  actors  is  out  of  the  secret 
that  the  others  know.  They  retired  early,  to  be 
awakened  about  midnight  by  the  steady  ringing  of 
the  telephone  bell  with  the  electric  mercilessness  of 
a  fire-gong.  Only  something  of  pressing  impor- 
tance could  account  for  such  persistency  at  that 
hour.  Lindley  himself  went  to  the  instrument, 
fear-stricken  lest  the  children  had  been  taken  ill. 

"It's  life  and  death  and  Mr.  Frane  asked  it,  sir," 
were  the  words  he  heard  as  he  put  the  receiver  to 
his  ear.  Then  Fanny,  listening,  heard  him  say: 
"You  can't  tell  how  bad?  I'm  coming  as  fast  as 
forced  draught  can  bring  me ;  tell  him  that  and  tell 
him  quick."  Then  he  began,  in  his  quiet  voice,  to 
give  orders,  bringing  out  of  their  beds  men  who 
would  have  arisen  only  at  his  command. 

"If  Benson  will  take  me  over  his  line  from  Bain- 
ville  to  Hopper  Junction  it  will  save  an  hour." 
Benson  was  one  of  Belmore's  worst  enemies. 
"Ask  him  to  do  it;  tell  him  it  is  a  family  matter. 
Every  limited  must  be  sidetracked  to  give  us  right 
of  way.  You  must  have  a  locomotive  and  car  at 
Wayne  Junction  in  three-quarters  of  an  hour — no? 
— you  must !  Stop  a  freight  and  take  a  locomotive 
off — then  stop  a  passenger!  I'll  be  at  the  Junc- 
tion in  three-quarters  of  an  hour  and  I'll  count 
every  minute  after  that  to  somebody's  discredit," 
he  concluded  as  he  hung  up  the  receiver. 

297 


Lucy  of  the  Stars 


"Fanny,"  he  said  at  her  door,  "there's  been  a 
wreck  and  John  is  in  it.  He  has  sent  for  me.  I'm 
going  to  take  a  special  at  the  Junction." 

"John — in  a  wreck  to-night — to-night!  Oh,  it's 
awful!"  she  said.  "I'm  going,  too — I  can  get 
ready  as  quick  as  you." 

"But,  Fanny — impossible!  You  can't  leave 
Lucy  and  Carniston  here." 

A  nearby  door  opened  and  an  English  voice 
spoke : 

"I  couldn't  help  overhearing  and  I'd  like  to  go, 
too.  The  fact  is,  I'm  not  sleepy  at  all,  and  he's 
such  a  thoroughbred.  I'd  like  to  go,  really.  You 
look  after  Mrs.  Belmore  and  I'll  wake  the  stable — 
I  can  help  a  little."  Barefooted,  Carniston  bolted 
along  the  hall,  with  Lindley  calling  after  him  what 
horses  to  take.  For  the  first  time  since  he  had  come 
to  America  Arthur  felt  that  he  was  doing  some- 
thing real. 

When  another  door  opened,  it  was  Lucy  who 
asked  to  join  in  this  journey  through  the  night  to 
John  Frane.  The  two  women  came  down  the 
stairs  with  their  hair  in  braids,  for  a  woman  can 
be  quick  when  a  man  is  sick,  instead  of  waiting 
below. 

Lindley,  who  drove,  minded  neither  the  ruts  nor 
the  horses'  lives  nor  wheels  spinning  in  the  air. 
Though  the  others  talked  he  spoke  never  a  word 

298 


A  Governor- Elect 

till,  rounding  the  hill  near  the  station,  they  saw  a 
locomotive  pulling  in. 

"Good  work!    We  have  lost  no  time/'  he  said. 

It  was  not  a  finely  appointed  private  car  that 
he  offered  to  his  guests  on  this  occasion.  The  pea- 
nut shucks  left  by  the  day  passengers  were  still  on 
the  floor.  No  one  had  thought  to  sweep  them  up 
in  the  preoccupation  of  that  order,  growing 
stronger  and  stronger  as  it  descended  the  lines.  It 
made  every  suddenly  awakened  employe  think  only 
of  the  one  word  "speed"  as  he  worked  under  the 
eye  of  the  commander  of  a  disciplined  industrial 
army.  The  station-master  started  to  express 
his  regrets  about  something;  but  Belmore  said, 
"Thanks;  well  done,"  before  the  words  were  out 
of  the  employe's  mouth. 

"Do  walk  those  horses  around  a  little  and  put 
some  blankets  over  them  afterwards!"  Carniston 
called  to  the  station-master.  He  was  trying  to 
be  useful,  and  at  least  he  knew  horses;  while  he 
was  as  unaccustomed  as  Lucy  to  the  American  reck- 
lessness of  breaking  one  thing  in  the  haste  to  repair 
another. 

The  young  engineer,  with  his  head  thrust  well 
out  of  the  cab,  was  watching  Lindley,  and  the  car 
started  instantly  the  commander's  foot  was  on  the 
steps. 

"It's  Belmore  himself  back  there  and  it's  a  fam- 
299 


Lucy  of  the  Stars 

ily  affair,"  he  said,  as  he  turned  to  his  fireman. 
"Get  the  kinks  out  of  your  backbone." 

Lindley  walked  up  and  down  the  aisle,  oblivious 
of  the  others,  his  head  bent  forward,  his  hands 
in  his  pockets.  The  attitude  was  a  favourite 
one  of  his  father's,  which  he  fell  into  whenever 
he  faced  a  critical  situation.  It  was  heredity 
breaking  through  the  repression  of  the  second 
generation. 

"By  God !  I  can't  stay  here  thinking  that  maybe 
John" — it  was  the  first  time  his  wife  had  ever 
heard  him  swear,  and  she  liked  him  for  it.  "I'm 
going  forward." 

When  the  fireman  saw  him  climbing  over  the 
coal,  that  grim  soldier  did  not  hesitate  to  take  the 
shovelful  fairly  out  from  under  the  feet  of  the 
man  whose  power  was  almost  feudal.  He  went 
on  with  his  work,  and  Lindley  noted  the  fact  and 
that  was  why  the  fireman  received  such  rapid  pro- 
motion afterwards. 

"Pretty  old,  isn't  she?"  Lindley  said  to  the  engi- 
neer, as  he  looked  over  the  engine.  "What  can 
you  get  out  of  her?" 

"Fifty  or  I'll  bust  her.  I  judge  that  was  your 
idea,  sir,  from  the  way  the  order  came  in;"  which 
explains  why  the  engineer  also  received  promotion. 

Lindley  nodded  and  looked  out  into  the  night. 

Back  in  the  day-car  the  brakeman  arranged  the 
300 


A  Governor-  Elect 

seats  to  make  beds  for  his  passengers,  who  thanked 
him  without  availing  themselves  of  his  thought- 
fulness.  Fanny,  gazing  absently  out  of  the  win- 
dow at  passing  lights  and  shadows,  was  thinking 
of  Geraldine,  who  had  been  kept  out  of  John's  life 
through  misunderstanding,  and  now  was  kept  from 
him  in  this  terrible  hour.  Lucy  and  Carniston  sat 
a  little  apart  from  her.  The  brakeman  wanted  to 
express  his  sympathy  and  finally  began  by  offering 
a  piece  of  pie  to  Carniston  and  a  piece  of  cake  to 
Lucy  out  of  the  luncheon  which  his  wife  had  put 
up  for  him. 

"Oh,  I've  got  heaps.  Mother's  always  afraid 
I'm  going  to  starve.  She  must  have  thought  I  was 
off  to  the  North  Pole  to-night  the  way  she  threw 
the  whole  pantry  into  the  basket  when  I  was  jump- 
ing into  my  pants  after  the  operator  called  me. 
No?  Well,  I'll  keep  it  for  you.  You'll  be  hungry 
before  light.  It" — and  there  he  brought  his  curi- 
osity to  expression — "it  must  be  something  pretty 
bad  to  bring  Mr.  Belmore  out  in  a  rush  like  this. 
Family  sick?" 

When  they  told  him  that  Frane  had  been  in- 
jured his  interest  was  instant  and  personal. 

"And  Mr.  Belmore's  going  to  him?"  he  asked 
incredulously.  He  could  not  quite  understand  this. 
Belmore  was  the  commander  of  his  livelihood  and 
John  Frane  of  his  political  opinions  and  sentiment. 

301 


Lucy  of  the  Stars 

It  was  difficult  for  him  to  associate  the  two;  and 
here  was  another  note  for  Dr.  von  Kar's  diary. 

"They  were  friends  at  school,"  Lucy  interjected. 

"Well,  that's  different.  That's  nothing  to  do 
with  politics  and  business.  I'd  vote  for  John  Frane 
for  anything  from  coroner  to  President.  Think  of 
it ! — just  when  he's  been  elected  to  get  into  a  cussed 
railroad  wreck!" 

He  went  out  on  the  platform  gloomily,  leaving 
Carniston  and  Lucy  as  good  as  alone.  Lucy  me- 
chanically closed  her  eyes,  although  she  did  not 
expect  to  sleep.  She  had  thought  of  Arthur  so 
much  that  it  seemed  that  there  was  nothing  to  say 
to.  him  now.  Beside  the  haunting  sense  of  the 
nature  of  their  errand  was  her  knowledge  of  Ger- 
aldine's  secret,  of  which  he  was  still  ignorant.  Al- 
though she  had  paved  the  way  for  him  to  propose 
to  Geraldine  on  the  ride  back  from  Smileys',  the 
fact  that  he  did  so  stung  her  deeply.  If  he  had 
only  waited  two  or  three  days,  she  told  herself. 

This  unpeopled  habitation  on  wheels,  with  its 
two  flickering  lights,  seemed  an  unbridled  monster 
carrying  her  and  the  man  she  loved  on  to  eternity. 
She  compared  it  to  that  fate  which  had  borne  her 
helplessly  in  its  train  for  the  last  two  dragging 
months.  The  same  thought  was  in  Carniston's 
mind.  Ahead  of  him  in  the  wreck,  dying  perhaps, 
was  a  man  who  had  lived  his  every  hour  in  the  joy 

302 


A  Governor- Elect 

of  labour,  and  on  the  locomotive  was  another  who 
had  the  power  to  bring  the  special  out  of  the  dark- 
ness and  give  it  right  of  way  by  a  few  words  spoken 
into  a  rubber  disc  in  a  country-house  at  midnight. 

"My  bent  is  futility,"  he  thought,  recalling 
his  father's  words.  "I  am  the  passenger,  while 
others  stoke  and  direct.  I  am  the  seventh  genera- 
tion and  I  was  born  with  the  shell  of  the  seventh 
and  the  impulses — some  of  them,  at  least — of 
the  first." 

"Where  is  Frane  going?"  he  asked,  to  break  the 
trend  of  his  thoughts  and  the  noise  of  their  flight. 

"He  was  coming  from  Washington."  She  did 
not  think  of  telling  him  more. 

"Does  he  leave  nothing  but  his  popularity — no 
relatives?" 

"None,"  she  rejoined;  "he  was  from  the  stars, 
too,  and  it's  a  mistake  to  have  even  a  summer  cot- 
tage there  while  the  problem  of  aerial  navigation 
remains  unsolved." 

"It's  odd  that  one  with  so  much  affection  should 
never  have  married,"  he  pursued. 

"Not  so  odd.  He  could  love  only  once,  you 
see,  and  he  loved  Geraldine  and  she  loved  him — 
but — just  money!"  This  much  she  might  tell 
without  breaking  her  promise  to  Fanny  about  the 
secret,  while  she  wondered  as  soon  as  she  spoke 
why  she  had  told  even  that.    Her  lids  were  droop- 

303 


Lucy  of  the  Stars 


ing,  and  she  did  not  see  Arthur's  look  of  surprise. 
Now  she  closed  them  altogether.  "Come,  we 
must  get  a  little  sleep,"  she  said. 

Carniston  went  out  on  the  platform,  where  the 
brakeman  talked  to  him  about  Frane.  The  careen- 
ing train  crashed  through  tunnels,  echoed  through 
valleys,  hummed  across  open  places.  They  passed 
the  faint  lights  in  station-windows,  the  lamps  out- 
lining the  streets  of  towns,  the  shadowy  houses 
of  sleeping  villages,  occasional  brakemen's  lan- 
terns, the  upturned  faces  of  Italians  in  the  flare 
of  torches  stepping  aside  from  their  work  on  the 
tracks,  day-cars  with  their  cramped,  reclining  pas- 
sengers, with  the  dark  sleepers  behind  them  on  the 
switches.  Lindley  Belmore  saw  these  things  only 
as  mile-posts.  The  click  of  every  rail  under  him 
was  another  step  nearer  his  friend — that  man 
whose  character  had  remained  through  life  as 
clear  as  it  was  at  school,  uninfluenced  by  comrade- 
ship or  surroundings. 

At  dawn,  as  the  car  slowed  down  suddenly,  they 
saw  at  the  other  end  of  the  curve  which  they  were 
rounding  the  piled  cars  of  the  wreck  still  smoulder- 
ing. The  neighbouring  fields  glistened  with  the 
first  frost  of  the  year.  About  a  nearby  farmhouse 
were  many  figures,  scattered  and  in  groups,  re- 
lieved by  white  specks  of  blankets  and  linen. 
Fanny  and  Lucy  and  Carniston  looked  at  one  an- 

3°4 


A  Governor-Elect 

other  significantly,  and  rose  without  speaking  as 
the  car  came  to  a  jolting  halt.  Lindley  had  for- 
gotten their  existence.  As  he  sprang  down  the 
steps  among  the  spectators  and  those  of  the  pas- 
sengers who  had  escaped  unhurt  and  were  nar- 
rating their  experiences  to  the  first  arrivals 
from  the  evening  papers,  he  was  thinking  only 
that  John  lay  there  among  the  injured  and  the 
dying. 

His  monosyllabic  question  was  answered  from 
a  dozen  throats.  Every  one  knew  where  John 
Frane  was.  The  politician's  triumph  and  the  say- 
ings from  his  speeches  were  still  fresh  in  men's 
minds.  He  was  near  to  the  people  in  the  very 
way  he  shared  his  faults  with  them.  The  passen- 
gers had  this  morning  seen  the  man  proved  in  the 
deed.  They  had  seen  him,  when  half-stunned  and 
bleeding  internally,  labouring  with  his  own  hands 
while  he  tried,  as  the  born  leader  would,  to  direct 
the  work  of  relief.  They  had  heard  his  insistence 
that  he  was  all  right  when  he  returned  to  conscious- 
ness after  he  had  fainted.  The  exact  words  of 
Surgeon  Holden,  who  happened  to  be  aboard  the 
train,  were  passed  from  lip  to  lip.  Holden  him- 
self was  also  famous  in  his  calling.  He  knew  John 
Frane's  face  at  sight,  as  the  others  did.  His  was 
also  the  true  professional  pride  which  counts  the 
truth  of  a  man's  work  above  all  things  else,  and 

3°5 


Lucy  of  the  Stars 

he  had  recognised  in  his  hasty  reading  of  his  morn- 
ing paper  that  Frane  was  a  kindred  fighter  in  an- 
other field. 

When  John  insisted  that  the  other  injured  ones 
should  be  taken  inside  the  house — "There  is  so 
much  more  room  outside;  I  prefer  it,"  he  said — 
Holden  whispered  not  to  irritate  him  and  "the 
more  fresh  air  the  better."  So  they  placed  him 
against  the  trunk  of  a  leafless  tree,  with  a  root  for  a 
pillow,  while  the  light  and  shadow  from  the  flames 
of  the  wreck  played  on  his  pale  face.  When  he 
asked  Holden  a  direct  question  the  surgeon  gave 
him  the  same  candid  answer  that  he  himself,  a 
strong  man,  too,  would  have  wanted  in  the  same 
situation.  Then  John  sent  for  two  men,  both  of 
whom  had  put  all  their  personal  power  behind 
specials.  Kennan  was  bending  over  John  when 
Belmore  approached. 

"He's  a  weak  brother,  that  lieutenant-gov- 
ernor," John  was  saying.  "He  reflects  the  colour 
of  the  branch  he's  on.  The  only  advantage  is  that 
it  is  easy  for  a  spineless  man  to  be  an  agent  for 
good  or  for  bad.  Well,  when  the  lieutenant- 
governor-elect  becomes  the  governor-elect,  what 
then?" 

Kennan  was  as  outspoken  as  the  surgeon.  He 
wasted  no  time  on  bedside  cheer.  He  understood 
how  superfluous  that  would  seem  to  John  in  this 

306 


A  Governor- Elect 

emergency.  His  jaw  came  up  sharp  with  every 
word,  for  he  was  thinking  as  he  talked,  and  he 
meant  to  make  good  every  word  he  said. 

"No,  the  lieutenant-governor  hasn't  the  back- 
bone of  a  charlotte  russe,"  he  said.  "He's  looking 
for  one,  and  I'll  be  there  first  and  supply  it.  I'm 
going  to  try,  my  boy,  to  be  just  as  human  and 
honest  as  you  are.  I  didn't  go  to  college,  you  see, 
and  you've  been  my  education.  I'm  going  to  try 
to  do  just  what  I  think  you  would  do." 

"Thanks,  Frank,"  and  he  called  Kennan  by  his 
first  name.  "You  can  do  it  better  than  I  could. 
I  have  been  to  school  to  you,  too.  You  know  the 
game  and  the  tricks  they  play  to  beat  a  man  even 
when  he  is  trying  to  do  right.  But  I  think  I  can 
give  you  a  valuable  hint  on  reformers.  They're 
like  the  others — some  are  good  and  some  are  bad. 
You'll  have  to  watch  out  for  the  gentlemen  who 
make  beautiful  speeches  about  saving  the  republic 
and  who  try  to  bribe  the  policeman  on  the  way 
home.  The  only  way  to  judge  reformers,  I've 
found,  is  by  the  amount  of  work  they're  ready  to 
do  after  they  have  addressed  the  meeting.  This 
is  a  democratic  government,  and  we  conduct  our 
public  schools  with  a  view  to  having  the  people 
understand  what  is  straight  and  what  is  not.  If 
you  are  going  to  make  a  deal,  make  it  before  their 
faces  and  not  under  cover." 

3°7 


Lucy  of  the  Stars 

"Yes,  I'm  going  back  to  'em  every  time,  as  you 
did.  If  they  don't  like  it,  it's  down  and  out.  This 
new  kind  of  politics  is  a  good  deal  simpler  than  I 
thought  it  was.    You  trust  me,  my  boy." 

"I  do.  You  have  been  fine  to  me;  everybody 
here  has.  It  was  kind  of  Mr.  Holden  to  tell  me 
the  truth  so  that  I  might  send  for  you.  You  know, 
Frank,  though  I  have  been  a  politician  I've  found 
it  a  good  world,  after  all." 

When  he  saw  Lindley,  John  smiled  faintly  and 
tried  to  offer  his  hand. 

"We  didn't  plan  it  just  this  way  when  we  were 
in  school,  did  we,  Lin?  I  hope  I  didn't  hurt  you 
by  the  way  I  left  you  alone  last  election.  I  wonder 
if  you  understand  how  much  I  have  loved  you.  I 
believe  in  you,  too.  It  has  always  been  easy  to 
know  just  where  to  find  the  Belmore  magnate.  He 
knew  that  giving  something  with  his  name  in  gilt 
across  it  was  not  the  best  way,  whether  it  was  a 
library  or  a  hospital.  In  the  world  in  which  fate 
placed  you,  old  fellow,  you  have  been  a  power  of 
light.  That  is  the  great  thing.  You  have  felt  the 
love  of  the  land  and  the  duty  of  keeping  close  to 
it,  and  you  have  felt  that  you  owed  this  hill  and 
that  river  and  the  people  of  the  town  something 
for  what  they  had  done  for  you.  Another  thing, 
Lin,  you  old  king,  smile  a  little  when  you  give; 
then  you'll  reach  the  hearts  of  men  and  you  can 

308 


A  Governor-  Elect 

do  them  more  good.  Here  I  am  making  a  speech 
to  my  betters  again ! 

"And,  Lin" — it  seemed  that  he  had  kept  the 
sweetest  thing  for  the  last — "I  didn't  want  to  wake 
Geraldine.  I  didn't  want  her  to  see  me  hors  de 
combat  like  this.  It  is  pleasant  to  think  that  her 
last  glimpse  of  me  was  when  I  was  well  and  myself. 
I  suppose  all  this  suffering  comes  to  her  because 
she  can  bear  it  bravely  and  go  on  smiling.  Tell 
her  that  the  game  and  the  governorship  were  noth- 
ing to  me  beside  her.  Tell  her — no,  tell  her 
nothing  that  will  make  her  burden  heavier." 

It  was  fitting  that  this  man  of  action  and  impulse 
— and  of  vagaries,  perhaps — should  pass  away 
suddenly  while  his  mind  was  still  clear  and  he  was 
still  in  harness. 


309 


XXIX 

FOR  A  SINGLE  DAY 

GERALDINE  had  slept  soundly  and  late; 
and,  half  awake,  she  wondered  if  she  had 
been  dreaming  the  scene  by  the  roadside  when  John 
Frane  had  laid  his  great  love  at  her  feet;  dream- 
ing the  ride  in  the  automobile  with  the  back  seats 
empty;  dreaming  the  plans  of  the  life  that  a  gov- 
ernor and  his  wife  should  lead,  and  dreaming  the 
kiss. 

"It's  too  good,"  she  breathed  to  herself,  in  the 
full  dawn  of  consciousness,  "this  thing  that  has 
come  to  me  simply  and  unexpectedly  and  as  gently 
as  blessings  mixed  with  the  dew  of  heaven." 

She  divided  life  into  two  parts,  as  girls  have 
done  out  of  time:  The  part  that  ended  with  yes- 
terday and  the  part  that  began  with  to-day.  In  the 
glow  of  her  happiness  she  slept  again.  When  she 
awoke  the  second  time  a  delicious  inspiration  en- 
thralled her:  She  would  write  to  John  now,  before 
she  dressed,  and  when  he  returned  to  Kearn's  Ford 
awaiting  him  on  his  desk  would  be  the  story  of  her 
thoughts  of  him  and  of  their  future  on  that  dear 

310 


For  a  Single  Day 


first  morning  after  their  engagement.  It  was  a 
long  letter,  this;  a  very  long  letter  for  her,  which 
she  sealed  in  wonder  at  the  ease  with  which  the 
words  had  come.  Did  love  make  speech  easy, 
then?  she  asked.  Would  it  bring  her  that  gift 
whose  absence  she  had  missed  so  often? 

Outside  her  door  lay  the  morning  paper  with 
its  leaded  stop-press  notice  of  the  wreck,  and  men- 
tion of  the  vital  fact  that  Governor-elect  Frane 
was  among  the  injured.  In  past  mornings  she 
would  have  seized  it  with  avidity  as  soon  as  she 
awoke.  Now  the  election  was  over,  and  she  had 
heard  the  story  of  how  it  was  won  from  the  win- 
ner and  the  story,  too,  of  all  his  plans. 

Fanny  felt  that  it  was  her  duty  to  be  the  first 
to  tell  the  news  to  Geraldine  in  order  to  soften  its 
shock.  When  Geraldine  heard  her  friend's  voice 
over  the  long-distance  wire  she  thought  that  she 
was  to  be  bantered  again  about  the  theft  of  an 
automobile.  After  she  understood  what  had  hap- 
pened she  remained  conscious  long  enough  to  hang 
up  the  receiver. 

When  she  awoke,  with  her  head  lying  on  the 
desk,  she  knew  that  the  new  life  had  lasted  only 
one  day  and  the  old  life  had  begun  again.  Her 
eyes  fell  on  the  letter  to  John.  She  kissed  it  and 
put  it  in  the  drawer. 

"I  said  it  was  too  good."  For  several  minutes 
3ii 


Lucy  of  the  Stars 


she  was  as  motionless  as  a  woman  of  stone.  "And 
I  couldn't  even  be  with  him  in  that  last  moment." 
Then  she  threw  herself  on  the  bed,  where  she  lay 
a  long  time  quietly  sobbing. 

"I  must  go  on  with  life  just  the  same,"  she  said 
when  she  arose,  "playing  the  game  as  he  would 
if  he  were  in  my  place." 

Her  mother,  who  had  never  liked  Frane,  would 
not  go  to  the  funeral.  Geraldine  made  the  journey 
alone,  and  thankfully  alone,  to  Kearn's  Ford.  The 
young  pastor  had  the  felicity  to  avoid  a  eulogy  of 
his  own  composition.  He  said  that  John  Frane 
meant  to  all  present  what  he  had  meant  to  himself 
and  words  could  not  express  that;  so  he  would 
only  read  a  little  speech  about  the  love  of  the  land 
that  John  had  once  made  to  the  school  children  of 
the  town. 

With  thousands  of  others,  Geraldine  and  the 
von  Kars  and  the  Belmores  and  Carniston  had 
their  last  glimpse  of  the  face  which  lay  among  the 
flowers.  To  Geraldine  he  seemed  to  be  smiling 
with  the  joy  of  work  and  the  joy  of  living.  Lucy 
saw  the  strength  in  the  chin  and  the  firm  lines 
around  the  mouth,  and  wished  that  the  man  whom 
she  loved  might  possess  them,  too.  Lindley  felt 
as  if  he  had  become  an  old  man  in  two  days,  and 
to  Fanny  it  was  as  if  she  and  Lin  were  left  alone 
forever  in  Kearn's  Ford. 

312 


For  a  Single  Day 

Geraldine  offered  no  excuse  to  Fanny  for  not 
remaining  over  night.  Through  the  car  window 
she  had  an  instant's  glimpse  of  the  first  house  that 
her  mother  had  built,  outlined  against  the  after- 
glow of  the  setting  sun.  She  hoped  that  she  might 
never  see  Kearn's  Ford  again.  The  thought  of  re- 
turning to  Washington  was  equally  hateful.  She 
wished  that  the  train  which  carried  her  might  run 
on  till  it  brought  her  to  some  new,  strange  land. 

She  had  not  come  in  mourning,  as  Fanny  had 
half  expected,  nor  had  she  mentioned  that  secret 
which  she  knew  would  be  faithfully  kept  by  those 
who  shared  it. 

"This  great  thing  is  mine,',  she  told  herself,  uto 
keep  forever.  It  is  sweeter  to  me  because  the 
world  knows  nothing  of  it." 


313 


XXX 

THE  LADY  OF  THE  PORTRAIT 

WE  ourselves  can't  abide  this  house  for 
months  to  come,"  Fanny  said  the  next 
morning  to  the  von  Kars,  who  had  set  their 
departure  for*  that  afternoon.  "You'll  come  to 
New  York,  won't  you,  Lucy,  and  you,  doctor? 
I  am  sure  that  it  will  be  a  mine  for  your  diary." 

"Yes,"  he  answered.  "I  find  I  wrote  so  much 
about  that  leader  of  men" — as  he  called  Frane  now 
— "that  I  had  to  buy  a  new  book.  You  know,  I'm 
going  to  send  a  letter  to  The  Times  explaining  to 
our  English  friends  why  it  is  that  only  America 
could  produce  him.  I  am  sure  that  they  do  not 
understand  him  at  all.  Thank  you,  we  shall  be 
delighted  to  come  to  New  York,  and  we  will  re- 
serve the  privilege  of  calling  on  you  there  later,  if 
we  may.  You  see,  I  have  promised  to  go  to  a 
dinner  in  Washington,  and  I  thought  I  should  like 
to  have  a  glimpse  of  that  side  of  America." 

They  went  to  the  capital  expecting  to  remain 
only  a  few  days,  but,  thanks  to  Lucy,  they  were 
to  be  there  for  many  long  weeks.     Her  languor, 

3H 


The  Lady  of  the  Portrait 

her  moodiness  and  her  growing  paleness  had  finally 
made  its  impression  on  the  doctor.  At  first  when 
he  rallied  her  she  met  him  half-way,  but  with  an 
exuberance  that  grew  more  and  more  affected,  until 
he  noted  that  her  never-care  songs  were  rarely 
merry  by  her  own  choice.  Here,  then,  was  an 
effect,  quoth  the  scientist.  When,  out  of  his  ab- 
stractions, he  had  deduced  a  cause  his  heart  was 
heavy. 

"Why  did  I  ever  leave  London?"  he  asked  him- 
self. He  began  to  refuse  all  invitations  which 
might  not  be  a  diversion  for  her  who  was  now  the 
sole  object  of  his  solicitude.  "I  have  always  said 
that  if  she  did  love  it  would  be  with  her  whole 
heart.  I  knew  she  had  the  blood  of  chivalry  in 
her  veins  and  the  quality  of  utterly  submerg- 
ing self  in  a  grand  enthusiasm.  I  cannot  resent 
what  she  has  inherited  from  me.  It  was  inevi- 
table when  two  such  souls  came  in  contact  that 
they  should  love.  But  time  will  cure  her  as  it 
cured  me.  As  she  is  going  out  more  and  more 
here,  we  will  remain  in  Washington  as  long  as 
she  chooses.  When  I  was  young,  I  know,  it  was 
best  to  let  me  have  my  way  and  run  my  course; 
so  she  shall  have  her  way.  Back  in  the  old  house 
in  London,  now,  she  would  have  nothing  to  do  but 
think  of  him." 

Lucy  did  not  see  Carniston  again  until  the  ball 
315 


Lucy  of  the  Stars 

at  the  British  embassy.  He  realised  that  while  he 
was  still  engaged  to  Geraldine  the  man  whom  she 
actually  loved,  as  Lucy  had  revealed  on  the  train, 
was  dead.  The  situation  was  already  difficult 
enough  when  he  returned  to  Washington  the  day 
after  the  funeral,  without  the  word  he  received 
from  the  worthy  himself  that  Wormley  was  coming 
to  America.  When  he  called  on  Geraldine  she 
seemed  if  anything  more  quiet  than  usual.  The 
handsome  couple  again  walked  along  Connecticut 
Avenue,  while  again  some  passers-by  envied  and  all 
admired  them.  He  spoke  of  an  invitation  that  he 
had  to  go  shooting  in  the  West.  His  grandfather 
had  been  a  great  hunter,  he  explained,  and  he 
thought  that*  he  himself  would  like  to  have  a  try 
at  new  game.  She  advised  him  to  go,  without 
making  any  reference  to  their  engagement.  Till 
Wormley  came,  then,  he  would  fortify  himself 
with  the  joy  of  the  open  air  and  the  primitive  sim- 
plicity of  hunting-camps. 

The  ambassador  would  not  listen  to  Carniston's 
departure  until  he  had  promised  to  return  in  time 
for  the  ball.  Next  to  Calkins  the  old  diplomat  was 
fonder  of  Arthur  than  of  any  of  the  titled  immi- 
grants who  had  come  for  many  years.  Calkins  he 
simply  adored. 

"Miss  Hodges  will  be  quite  the  queen  of  the 
occasion,"  he  wrote  to  Carniston,  later.    "Besides, 

316 


The  Lady  of  the  Portrait 

we  shall  have  a  Miss  von  Kar,  whom  you  know. 
That  little  German  girl,  as  Washington  calls  her, 
has  won  all  of  our  hearts.  Lady  Bromley  and  I  had 
her  with  us  for  dinner  last  night  en  famille,  when 
she  sang  some  of  her  never-care  songs.  Peculiar 
bits  they  are,  and  the  way  she  does  them  certainly 
rings  the  bell,  as  our  American  friends  say.  She 
has  the  art  of  listening,  too.  The  older  I  grow 
and  possibly,  therefore,  because  I  have  the  more 
to  say,  the  less  I  am  given  to  talking,  and  it  is 
quite  extraordinary  how  Miss  von  Kar  led  me 
to  tell  her  most  of  the  interesting  things  of  my 
career.  ...  So  never  mind  the  mountain  lions, 
her  ladyship  bids  me  tell  you;  return  and  be  the 
lion  of  our  ball." 

The  date  of  the  ball  was  the  same  as  that  on 
which  John  Frane  would  have  been  inaugurated 
governor.  This  may  explain  why  Geraldine  de- 
clined Their  Excellencies'  invitation.  She  held  as 
steadfastly  to  her  decision  in  the  face  of  parental 
fussing  as  on  that  day  when  she  called  her  mother 
to  the  telephone  to  make  a  denial  of  a  certain  pub- 
lished report.  Mrs.  Hodges  herself  went,  of 
course.  It  was  the  first  time  that  she  had  been  in- 
vited to  the  embassy,  which  showed  already  the 
value  of  her  acquaintance  with  Carniston ;  and  her 
social  ambitions  lay  in  the  direction  of  Connecticut 
Avenue  rather  than  in  that  of  the  old  colonial 

31? 


Lucy  of  the  Stars 

house  across  Lafayette  Square  which  Geraldine 
and  many  of  his  countrymen  had  hoped  might  one 
day  be  the  residence  of  John  Frane.  While  her 
mother  was  enjoying  the  company  of  the  great, 
Geraldine  was  reading  again  in  the  evening  papers 
the  inaugural  address  of  the  weak  brother,  which 
was  as  strong,  although  it  lacked  the  personal  char- 
acter, as  Frane's  own  address  might  have  been. 
The  thoughts  were  Boss  Kennan's  and  the  lan- 
guage that  of  the  newspaper  man  who  was  his  new 
secretary. 

Lucy  went  to  the  ball  for  the  same  reason  that 
she  had  thrown  herself  heart  and  soul  into  sym- 
pathy with  John's  campaign.  The  ghosts  were  so 
persistent  now  that  they  took  hold  of  her  fingers 
as  she  pressed  them  to  the  keys  of  the  piano.  She 
wore  the  famous  gown  and  the  imitation  pearl 
necklace,  and  the  effect  was  as  Monsieur  Celestin 
had  prophesied.  The  men  exclaimed,  "What  a 
girl!"  and  the  women  immediately  wondered  who 
had  "designed  it." 

But  who  was  the  fine  old  man  with  Lucy !  The 
doctor  did  not  often  suffer  himself  to  be  vain,  yet 
he  had  brought  to  America  the  bush  to  the  wine 
before  it  was  sampled.  Across  his  breast  lay  two 
rows  of  medals ;  and  there  are  medals  and  medals, 
as  surely  as  there  are  wars  and  kings  who  honour 
scientific  achievements  that  lessen  the  burdens  of 

318 


The  Lady  of  the  Portrait 

overcrowded  populations.  You  may  have  all  the 
fourth-  and  all  the  fifth-class  ones  and  your 
march  of  triumph  will  be  only  that  of  the  sergeant- 
major  who  goes  ahead  of  the  general.  The  legation 
people  know  which  ones  are  significant  and  which 
are  not  and  the  advantages  of  the  old-world  cus- 
tom which  officially  enables  you  to  put  a  man  in 
his  proper  pigeon-hole  immediately  without  the 
trouble  of  an  investigation.  It  was  the  Austrian 
ambassador  first,  pretending  to  see  through  his 
eye-glass,  whose  naked  eye  noted  one  of  the  doc- 
tor's medals  which  spoke  volumes  to  him.  When 
he  said  the  "Ah!"  of  understanding  to  the  doc- 
tor, the  answer  was  "Maximilian,"  as  if  it  were 
a  password;  and  so  it  was  with  the  Austrian  am- 
bassador. 

However,  it  is  not  the  Austrian  ambassador  who 
concerns  us  in  this  story,  but  the  Russian  ambassa- 
dress. 

"Lord  Bromley  told  me  about  your  wonderful 
never-care  songs,"  she  said  to  Lucy,  and  as  she 
spoke  the  ostrich  feathers  of  her  fan  trembled  with 
emotion. 

"Yes,"  Lucy  said  sweetly,  but  with  a  peculiarly 
English  manner;  for  she  did  not  like  to  be  intro- 
duced to  people  as  a  minstrel. 

As  the  countess  led  the  way  to  seats  outside  the 
crush,  Lucy  studied  her  face  wonderingly. 

3l9 


Lucy  of  the  Stars 

"We  have  met  before,  haven't  we?  Where?'' 
she  asked,  in  a  reaction  of  good  humour  after  that 
cutting  little  "yes." 

"Where?"  the  countess  repeated  rather  va- 
cantly, and  she  looked  down  at  her  fan.  That 
melodramatic  scene  which  she  had  wished  to  avoid 
the  girl  had  unwittingly  precipitated  at  once. 

Lucy  was  trying  to  look  behind  the  years  that 
had  lined  the  countess's  face  as  one  tries  to  make 
out  features  through  a  veil. 

"I  know  now,"  she  said  at  length,  and  mar- 
velled how  she  could  speak  so  coolly.  "Your  face 
has  been  over  my  father's  desk  ever  since  I  can 
remember.  You  were  younger  then,  but  not  dif- 
ferent or  more  charming,  I  fancy."  Playing  with 
those  last  words  as  she  would  with  the  words  of 
a  song,  she  made  them  significant. 

"My  child!"  The  countess  made  a  Continental 
gesture.  But  the  hand  which  she  started  to  seize 
in  her  own  was  engaged  at  this  critical  instant  in 
drawing  the  hem  of  Monsieur  Celestin's  creation 
closer  about  its  wearer's  feet,  lest  some  passer-by 
should  step  on  it. 

"Really!"  said  Lucy. 

"You — you  who  are  so  electric,  so  mercurial,  so 
brilliantly  changeable  in  mood  that  everybody  in 
Washington  wants  you  to  dinner!"  the  countess 
gasped,  in  admiration  of  that  quality  of  sangfroid 

320 


The  Lady  of  the  Portrait 

which  she  herself  had  made  a  matter  of  lifetime 
cultivation. 

An  observer  would  have  said  that  the  surprise 
was  entirely  on  her  part,  not  on  Lucy's.  She  had 
known  for  the  last  ten  days  that  the  Dr.  von  Kar 
who  was  in  Washington  was  the  one  of  her  story. 
Once,  unrecognisable  behind  her  veil,  she  had 
passed  him  in  the  street.  She  had  looked  forward 
to  the  inevitable  meeting  with  him,  and  as  a  child- 
less old  woman  had  even  built  her  castles  of  air. 

"Dear  girl,"  she  said,  with  a  simulation  of  non- 
chalance, "I  was  not  altogether  to  blame.  May  I 
tell  a  romance  in  a  word?  There  was  a  war  be- 
tween France  and  Germany  in  seventy  and  seventy- 
one,  when  a  proud  people  were  overrun  by  the 
strongest  of  all  people — except  the  horrid  English, 
as  the  count  says — and  I  was  one  of  the  proud 
people.  Oh,  I'll  not  go  into  details.  It  sounds  too 
much  like  a  novel  as  it  is;  but  it's  nothing  beside 
the  story  of  the  Portuguese  minister  and  his  wife. 
The  girl  was  caught  in  a  country-house  and  a  franc- 
tireur  appeared,  all  fire  for  the  French  and  'all 
there,'  as  the  Americans  say,  courageous  as  a  devil 
and  handsome,  too.  He  was  in  the  mid-thirties 
then,  your  father,  half  student,  half  soldier,  with 
the  charm  of  youth  and  the  force  of  maturity  uni- 
ted. He  had  fought  in  Mexico  and  Algeria  and 
Italy. 

321 


Lucy  of  the  Stars 

"I  thought  that  his  fighting  would  end  forever 
when  Paris  fell.  But  it  seems  it  was  not  to  be  so. 
I  was  to  wait  at  home,  and  he  was  to  go  to  war  and 
travel  when  he  pleased.  After  the  Commune, 
after  peace  came,  after  France  out  of  her  vine- 
yards and  her  thrift  had  paid  her  debt  and  we 
were  ourselves  again,  I  had  my  fortune  and  my 
position  back  and  your  father's  fortune,  too.  I  rode 
again  in  the  Elysee  and  the  Bois.  I  was  of  the 
world — that  has  killed  me.  Your  father,  grow- 
ing restless,  was  ready  for  adventure  once  more. 
He  always  had  a  wonderful  mind;  I  fancy  he  was 
learning  three  languages  while  he  was  still  at  milk. 
Now  what  do  you  think  he  did  in  seventy-three? 
He  started  out  in  search  of  the  broken  link  between 
the  Christianity  of  the  Abyssinians  and  the  Chris- 
tianity of  the  North — or  something  like  that!" 

"Truly — why  not?"  Lucy  asked  in  a  monotone 
which  would  have  done  credit  to  Geraldine.  "I 
think  that  it  would  have  been  most  interesting,  and 
how  father  would  have  enjoyed  reading  the  re- 
sults of  his  investigation  before  learned  societies!" 

"You  do  1"  The  countess  blinked  and  beat  her 
knee  with  her  fan.  "At  all  events,"  she  pursued, 
trying  to  keep  down  her  agitation,  "he  kept  on 
with  his  wanderings  till  he  turned  up  in  the  Russo- 
Turkish  war.  Then  when  he  came  back  he  was 
like  an  apparition,  for  it  was  more  than  a  year 

322 


The  Lady  of  the  Portrait 

after  he  had  been  reported  dead.  I  was  married 
to  the  count  and  you  were  two  years  old.  You 
see  the  embarrassing  situation,"  and  she  tried  to 
smile,  "for  me  and  the  count,  too.  I  had  fallen 
into  the  way  of  gambling  a  little  and  I  was  of  the 
world,  as  I  tell  you,  and  I  liked  life  and  I  spent 
freely.  My  dear,  I  was  stone  broke,  as  they  say. 
But  I  was  good-looking.  You  can  see  that  by  the 
old  picture,  can't  you  ?  The  count  was  young  and 
handsome,  a  man  of  great  wealth,  and  a  first  secre- 
tary of  embassy,  and — well,  what  would  you  when 
my  soldier  of  fortune  was  dead? 

"Your  father  never  called  on  me  but  once  after 
he  returned.  He  sent  me  a  note  which  was  like 
him  in  those  days — I  don't  know  what  he  is  like 
now — saying,  'So  glad  for  your  sake  that  you 
heard  the  report.  So  sorry  for  my  sake  that  it  was 
not  true.  It  is  delightful  that  you  have  all  the 
money  you  want.'  He  called  once,  as  I  say,  and 
then  he  went  up  to  the  nursery  and  took  you  in  his 
arms.  Marmy  and  I  were  spectators  on  the  stairs. 
He  only  said  to  us,  'She  is  mine,  if  you  please.' 
Ah,  he  was  magnificent  that  day,  making  you  feel 
that  if  you  stepped  across  his  path  you  would  go 
under  the  wheels !  He  was  like  he  was  when  I  fell 
in  love  with  him — the  splendid  audacity  of  him! 

"So  he  took  you  out  and  put  you  in  the  cab  and 
that  was  the  last  I  saw  of  you.     Should  we  have 

3*3 


Lucy  of  the  Stars 

taken  the  matter  to  the  police?  Should  we  have 
advertised?  Ours  was  a  public  position,  and 
Marmy  was  not  very  sorry  to  have  you  gone. 
Then  we  expected — but  now,  you  see,  you  are  my 
only  child.  I  have  grown  old  and" — still  no  help- 
ing word  from  the  listener — "and  it's  quite  odd, 
isn't  it,  quite  like  a  novel?" 

Lucy  looked  up  for  the  first  time  during  the 
narrative  and  opened  her  eyes  questioningly. 

"Why  shouldn't  my  father  have  taken  me 
away?"  she  asked. 

"You  are  glad  that  he  took  you  away?"  the 
countess  exclaimed. 

"Why,  yes,  of  course."  Lucy  seemed  surprised 
at  a  question  whose  answer  was  so  obvious. 

"Have  you  never  felt  the  need  of  a  mother?" 

"Were  you  thinking  how  much  I  needed  one 
when  you  let  father  take  me  downstairs?  Wasn't 
that  a  test  of  maternal  affection?" 

The  countess  could  make  no  answer.  As  a 
woman  of  the  world,  however,  the  manner  of  the 
rebuff  made  her  appreciate  the  value  of  the  thing 
she  had  lost  when  the  soldier  of  fortune  made  his 
descent  upon  the  nursery. 

"You  are  marvellous,"  she  said,  "quite  as  mar- 
vellous as  they  say.  I  might  have  known  that  you 
would  be." 

The  countess  told  herself  that  she  must  go 
324 


The  Lady  of  the  Portrait 

slowly  with  this  little  girl  if  she  would  achieve  the 
end  she  had  in  view.  She  ventured  to  hope  that 
Lucy  might  come  to  luncheon  with  her,  and  Lucy 
declined  with  a  shade  of  surprise  that  seemed  to 
say,  "My  dear  lady,  if  you  will  so  transgress  the 
proprieties  you  must  expect  to  be  refused  without 
the  invention  of  a  polite  excuse."  Still  the  count- 
ess was  not  abashed.  She  determined  to  go  on 
trying  to  find  some  ground  of  approach  until  Lucy 
should  rise  and  leave  her.  To  judge  from  her  face 
Lucy  was  remaining  because  she  was  faintly 
amused.  The  countess  wondered  if  the  girl  had  a 
heart  of  stone.  It  did  not  occur  to  her  that  the 
current  of  Lucy's  agony  was  so  deep  that  its  sur- 
face was  unruffled. 

"Those  are  very  beautiful  pearls,"  she  finally 
ventured. 

Lucy's  flush  when  she  thought  of  the  lie  they 
represented  flooded  the  neck  which  the  false  string 
circled. 

"They  are  imitation,"  she  hastened  to  say.  "But 
they  are  more  valuable  to  me  than  if  they  were 
real,"  she  went  on,  defiantly.  "My  father  gave 
them  to  me.  You  see,  he  is  only  a  poor  working 
chemist — but  with  a  great,  good  soldier's  heart — 
who  likes  to  think  that  his  daughter  has  things  as 
fine  as  other  girls  have.  I  wear  them  to  please 
him." 

325 


Lucy  of  the  Stars 

As  the  countess  bent  over  and  took  the  chain 
in  her  fingers  the  more  closely  to  examine  it,  her 
touch,  which  was  like  wet  ashes  to  Lucy,  found 
life  and  youth  in  contact  with  the  young  flesh. 

"You  can't  fool  me  on  pearls,  my  dear,"  said  the 
countess.  "I  know  that  the  average  person  can't 
tell  a  hundred  thousand  dollar  string  from  a  five 
hundred  dollar  string,  but  once  you  do  know,  you 
know  forever." 

"They  are  imitation,"  Lucy  repeated;  "my 
father  said  they  were.  Whatever  he  may  have  had 
when  you  knew  him,  Madame,  he  has  no  money 
now  with  which  to  buy  real  pearls."  She  drew 
away  tremblingly  from  the  countess's  fingers,  which 
still  held  the  strands.  "Please — I  don't  under- 
stand you,  and  I  don't  want  to  be  rude  even  to 
you." 

Lucy  would  have  risen  then  even  if  Carniston 
had  not  come  to  claim  her  for  a  waltz.  The  count- 
ess noted  the  glance  that  passed  between  her 
daughter  and  the  handsome  youth  who  had  the 
American  distinction  that  night  of  wearing  no 
medals.  These  two  must  know  each  other  well, 
else  she  would  not  have  called  him  Arthur  and  he 
called  her  Lucy.  She  watched  them  through  the 
waltz,  her  dark  eyes  sharp  with  curiosity. 


326 


Lucy  would  have  risen  then  even  if  Carniston  had  not  come  to 
claim  her  for  a  waltz 


XXXI 

THE    CABIN  AND  THE  GIRL 

CALKINS  had  expressed  the  feelings  of  two 
guests  of  the  embassy  exactly  before  they 
went  downstairs  on  the  evening  of  the  ball. 

"I'd  rather  have  half  an  hour's  polo,"  he  said, 
"or  see  the  whites  of  the  Afridis'  eyes  when  we  get 
close,  than  own  the  whole  show,  unless  I  could 
turn  it  into  money.  If  I  could  do  that  I  wouldn't 
be  staying  in  Washington  long,  I  assure  you." 

"The  decorations  aren't  half  as  good,"  Car- 
niston  replied,  "as  that  blue  sky  out  in  Colorado. 
The  ices  will  be  rather  insipid  beside  the  grub  that 
you  get  off  the  chuck  waggon  out  there." 

"You  know  I  heard  one  of  these  American  words 
the  other  day,"  Calkins  resumed  vacantly,  "which 
precisely  explains  my  situation  and  I  rather  fancy 
yours,  too.     You  and  I  are  misfits." 

"Yes,  and  I  suppose  it's  our  fault.  One 
shouldn't  quarrel  with  his  tailor  about  the  styles." 

"No — not  mine!"  Calkins  responded  sharply. 
"No,  I  wasn't  trained  for  this  pidgin.  I  was  a 
younger  son  and  they  sent  me  out  to  India.     It's 

327 


Lucy  of  the  Stars 

not  fair  to  be  switched  into  a  different  branch  of 
the  service  when  you  are  forty.  My  word,  I've 
looked  the  field  over  and  I  must  say  that  that  little 
Miss  von  Kar — she's  all  English,  if  they  do  call 
her  German — is  worth  all  the  other  entries  put 
together.  I  wonder  why  it  is  that  English  girls 
are  always  poor,  or  spoken  for,  or  in  trade.  I 
couldn't  marry  into  trade — not  at  home — posi- 
tively, no." 

To  Carniston,  the  American  girls  were  interest- 
ing in  the  same  way  as  the  boxes  at  the  horse  show. 
The  ensemble  was  pleasing  to  look  upon,  but  he 
did  not  know  where  to  begin  with  any  particular 
one,  while  their  twang  made  his  ears  tingle.  If  the 
lion  was  blushing  slightly  and  was  slightly  bashful, 
why,  those  who  took  their  cue  from  Bender  only 
found  him  the  more  attractive.  The  simple  truth 
was  that  the  lion  was  waiting  and  watching  for 
Lucy,  who  came  rather  late.  The  temptation  was 
strong  to  shut  out  the  face  of  Wormley  and  the 
grim  pages  of  the  ledger  for  one  night,  without 
thinking  of  the  cost  to  the  partner  of  his  folly. 

When  he  saw  Lucy  in  that  gown  which  made 
a  Frenchwoman  who  caught  sight  of  it  exclaim, 
"Oh,  the  little  one !  Who  is  she?  and  where  is  she 
from?  and  why?"  Carniston,  revelling  in  the  sight 
of  her,  drinking  to  the  full  of  her,  told  himself 
that  she  must  and  should  be  his  wife.     For  he  was 

328 


The  Cabin  and  the  Girl 

fresh  from  the  West,  where  torsos  are  broad  and 
frames  are  lean  and  eyes  are  blue  and  institutions 
are  as  distant  as  the  legend  of  the  Buddha.  Here 
was  the  girl  he  loved,  and  what  was  simpler  than 
that  he  should  forget  all  others  but  her?  His  trip 
after  mountain  lions  had  given  him  some  of  the 
strength  and  directness  of  the  hunter  earl. 

Lucy  would  not  allow  him  all  the  dances  he 
asked,  and  out  of  those  that  she  did  not  occupy 
he  gave  most  to  Lady  Bromley  and  the  wife  of  a 
Cabinet  officer,  reserving  one  for  "hope,"  as  he  ex- 
pressed it.  Lucy  wrote  "hope"  on  her  list  too.  She 
offered  herself  an  explanation  for  her  conduct  no 
more  than  he  offered  himself  an  explanation  for 
his.  The  "hope"  number  was  after  the  waltz 
which  followed  her  interview  with  the  countess. 
He  who  knew  the  embassy  building  so  well  led  her 
to  a  retreat  where  they  would  be  quite  alone. 

"Lucy,  I  have  had  a  wonderful  time  in  the 
West,"  he  said,  and  his  manner  was  that  of  the 
youth  who  had  returned  from  Norway.  "You 
know  that  I  found  life  out  there  just  as  John  Frane 
told  me  it  would  be,  quite  as  the  hunter  wrote  in 
his  diary  that  it  was,  quite  as  I  once  heard  Lord 
Baringbury  describe  it  to  my  father.  I  begin  to 
believe  that  Baringbury  was  such  a  great  Prime 
Minister  because  he  roughed  it  in  Australia,  and 
there  learned  a   philosophy  and  attained  a   big- 

329 


Lucy  of  the  Stars 

ness  of  range  that  never  left  him.  Out  West  a 
man  is  simply  a  man.  Isn't  it  strange  that  one 
should  have  to  travel  so  far  to  find  this?  You 
know,  I  begin  to  understand  the  hunter  and  Cal- 
kins and  fellows  I've  met  from  India  and  other 
places  who  used  to  seem  rather  monstrosities  to 
me.  It's  strange  and  delightful  to  find  yourself 
in  a  place  where  you  are  not  enmeshed  in  such  a 
skein  of  conventionality  that  if  you  move  you  are 
smothered  and  warned  of  your  folly  in  trying  to 
escape.  In  the  West  men  fight  nature  and  one 
another.  Nature  is  such  a  straight,  clean  foe  be- 
side conventionality.  And,  Lucy,  you  remember 
what  Frane  said  about  the  cabin  and  the  girl  when 
we  were  on  the  steamer  ?" 

"Yes."     That  idea  had  always  fascinated  her. 

UI  saw  the  cabins  out  there!"  he  cried  boyishly. 
"I  met  men  who  had  girls  waiting  back  East. 
Amazing,  isn't  it!  It  set  me  thinking.  I  found 
myself  feeling  as  if  I  were  something  more  than  an 
institution.  I  asked  myself,  haven't  I  just  as 
much  right  as  anybody  to  wage  my  battle  against 
nature  and  make  my  clearing  and  build  my  cabin? 
I  did  fairly  well  at  Oxford,  and  I  know  a  good 
deal  about  science;  why  shouldn't  I  apply  it  to 
earning  a  livelihood  as  your  father  has?  I  went' 
to  the  doctor  as  soon  as  I  arrived  to-day  and  told 
him  the  truth.    I  told  him  that  my  estate  was  bank- 

330 


The  Cabin  and  the  Girl 

rupt,  and  I  asked  him  if  I  couldn't  get  a  place  in 
the  new  factory." 

"You  didn't  tell  him  that " 

"No.  I  haven't  forgotten  my  promise.  It  was 
purely  what  Americans  call  a  business  propo- 
sition." 

"But  he  didn't  suspect?  You  are  sure?  It 
would  make  him  worry  and  make  him  miserable." 

"No,  not  in  the  least,  I  assure  you." 

"And  what  did  he  say?"  she  asked. 

"He  smiled  at  me  in  the  same  way  that  father 
and  Lord  Brent  did.  'Quel  garqonP  he  exclaimed. 
'It's  like  going  to  a  play.  It's  like  a  fairy  story, 
and  I  must  say  it  is  quite  refreshing  to  find  that 
such  romantic  thoughts  are  still  entertained.  But 
they'll  never,  never  do,  Carniston,  in  the  age 
of  steam  and  practical  politics.'  That  was  what 
he  said.  That  is  what  they  would  say  in  London 
or  New  York  or  Paris.  But  what  would  the  fel- 
lows around  the  chuck  waggon  say?  Why,  I  can 
hear  them :  'Hustle  and  get  a  job  and  marry  the 
girl  you  want  to.  What's  to  hinder?  Ain't  this 
the  United  States?  Ain't  this  a  free  country? 
The  trusts  haven't  got  it  all  yet,  though  they're 
fencin'  it  in  with  barb  wire  pretty  fast.'  " 

"And  father — did  you  tell  him  that?" 

"No,  I  couldn't  tell  him  that  without  telling 
him  I  was  in  love.     I  only  said  that  I  wanted  to 

33* 


Lucy  of  the  Stars 

earn  my  own  living.  And  he  said  ''Quel  garqonP 
again  and  warned  me  of  my  duty  to  my  estate.  I 
was  an  institution;  I  must  make  a  rich  marriage. 
He  suggested  Miss  Hodges." 

"Father  is  a  wise,  kind  man,  with  a  deep  expe- 
rience of  the  world/'  Lucy  said  slowly  to  herself. 

"Lucy!"  Carniston  had  seized  her  hands  in  his. 
"Lucy,  I  do  own  myself  and  I'll  do  as  I  please. 
I'll  throw  it  all  up.  I'll  laugh  in  the  face  of 
Wormley  to-morrow.  If  I  find  the  cabin,  will  you 
be  the  girl?    Will  you — will  you?" 

His  words  were  sweeter  even  than  the  glorious 
first  words  in  the  house  in  London.  She  was  see- 
ing him  in  all  his  attractiveness,  so  kindly,  so  clean 
in  his  thoughts,  so  surely  a  companion  for  a  good 
woman.  His  was  something  more  than  the  Car- 
niston charm  of  manner.  Could  you  have  traced, 
by  examining  his  blood,  the  strain  from  the  dollish 
mother  who  in  childhood  imagined  how  she  would 
like  to  be  the  countess  of  a  fairy  tale,  and  finding 
herself  one  was  altogether  so  naive  and  lovely  in 
the  part  that  the  "amiable  Carny,"  in  the  midst  of 
his  spendthrift  career,  was  sometimes  amazed  and 
again  delighted?  More  than  once  he  had  said  to 
her,  "What  a  girl!" 

"Lucy,  will  you — will  you?"  Arthur  repeated. 

Her  head  was  bowed.  It  was  not  her  wish  to 
win  him  for  a  moment,  but  to  hold  him  forever. 

332 


The   Cabin  and  the  Girl 

"Arthur,  I  am  in  Monsieur  Celestin's  gown 
which  cost  father  a  good  part  of  a  piece  of  luck 
and,  Arthur,  we  are  at  a  ball,  when  it  seems  as  if 
some  invisible  hand  had  made  all  the  flowers  and 
the  decorations  and  the  plumage  of  the  guests  and 
they  were  not  the  result  of  hard  work  and  money, 
money,  money,  before  the  curtain  went  up.  When 
you  stop  to  think  that  the  curtain  must  come  down 
in  the  morning  it  is  a  warning  not  to  live  your  part 
too  deeply  over  night." 

She  wanted  to  say  yes;  to  fall  into  his  arms  and 
make  him  stronger  with  her  strength.  If  he  had 
been  like  Frane  or  the  hunter  earl  and  had  put  his 
word  to  such  a  plan — but  she  loved  him  none  the 
less  on  this  account;  the  more,  probably. 

"You  know  what  we  said  once  about  holding 
hands,  Arthur,  and  being  grave  and  brave  and  rea- 
sonable," she  began,  drawing  away  from  him.  "I 
couldn't  bear  it  if — if  I — and  if  afterwards — 
Arthur,  you  will  think  to-night  and  you  will  think 
in  the  morning,  and  then  if  you  will  come  to  me  at 
tea-time  and  say  the  same  thing — why,  then,  to- 
morrow afternoon  will  be  the  beginning  of  the 
great  good  joy;  and  you  and  I  will  go  together  to 
father  and  tell  him  that  you  are  after  the  cabin  and 
I  am  the  girl. 

"Arthur,"  she  put  out  her  hand,  "let  us  go 
where  the  air  is  fresher.     You  won't  mind  if  I 

333 


Lucy  of  the  Stars 

rest  myself  on  your  arm  for  just  a  minute?  You 
are  so  strong;  you  have  been  out  West."  Thus 
they  started  to  descend  the  stairs.  "Now  the  little 
dizziness  is  over;  I  am  quite  right  again.  It's  late, 
isn't  it?  Won't  you  find  father  and  tell  him  that  I 
am  ready  to  go  ?  No,  no — I  have  my  hand  on  the 
balusters.  I  can  get  a  drink  in  the  cloak-room. 
Good  night.  To-morrow  afternoon  the  girl  will 
be  waiting — not  in  the  cabin,  but  in  a  hotel  apart- 


Lucy  noted  to  her  father,  with  an  effort  at  cheer- 
fulness, how  the  carriage  door  swings  open  softly 
when  you  arrive  and  bangs  when  you  go  away.  As 
soon  as  they  were  clear  of  the  lights  her  head 
dropped  on  his  shoulder. 

"I  met  my  mother  to-night,"  she  said,  slowly. 

The  long  silence  which  followed  was  fraught 
with  fear  and  perplexity  for  the  doctor.  Lucy  had 
found  him  in  a  falsehood.  Did  it  mean  that  he 
would  lose  her  ?  Had  she  taken  her  mother's  part  ? 
The  words  of  his  own  conversation  with  the 
countess  that  evening  ran  through  his  mind.  It 
was  the  first  that  he  had  known  of  her  presence 
in  Washington.  Ever  since  they  had  parted  she 
had  been  as  a  dead  woman  to  him.  He  was  not 
even  aware  that  the  name  of  the  Russian  ambas- 
sador to  America  was  Marmoff. 

334 


The  Cabin  and  the  Girl 

She  had  not  seen  him  until  after  her  talk  with 
Lucy  and  she  had  recovered  herself,  when  she  had 
audaciously  greeted  him  as  "Emil"  with  her  first 
sentence.  She  had  told  him  of  her  hope  that  the 
past  might  be  so  well  buried  that  his  daughter 
could  become  the  protegee  of  an  ambassadress  in 
order  that  her  own  mother  might  be  near  her.  He 
had  said  stiffly  that  Lucy  was  no  one's  protegee. 
She  had  asked  him  if  the  portrait  he  had  hung  over 
his  desk  was  the  same  that  she  had  drawn  of  her- 
self, as  she  looked  in  a  mirror,  on  the  back  of  an 
envelope  one  memorable  day  during  the  siege  of 
Paris  ?  It  was,  he  admitted.  And  why  had  he  hung 
it  there?  "When  I  saw  that  Lucy  did  not  have 
your  features,"  he  had  answered,  "but  those  of 
my  mother,  I  kept  the  portrait  for  the  same  reason 
that  I  kept  the  hat  and  the  carbine.  They  wrote 
finis  to  the  two  motives  of  my  old  career.  If  I 
became  restless  and  felt  that  I  might  wander  away 
again  from  the  path  I  had  set  myself  for  my 
daughter's  sake,  I  always  had  before  my  eyes  the 
insignia  of  folly  and  the  end  of  folly.  Madame, 
I  was  a  franc-tireur,  which  was  not  playing  fair. 
Madame,  I  loved  you,  which  was  simply  lunacy." 
She  had  made  a  grimace  and  remarked,  "How 
characteristic!"  He  must  have  become  rich  again 
to  afford  such  a  fine  gown  and  such  a  superb  string 
of  pearls  for  "our  Lucy,"  as  the  countess  persisted 

335 


Lucy  of  the  Stars 

in  calling  his  daughter.  "Madame,  I  must  be  im- 
polite," he  had  said,  with  simple  assurance;  "pos- 
sibly your  eyes  are  growing  old."  Then  she  had 
told  him  that  she  knew  from  what  she  had  seen 
that  night  that  Lucy  loved  the  earl.  "Madame," 
he  had  answered,  "she  does  nothing  of  the  kind. 
Good  night." 

For  if  he  was  sure  of  any  one  thing  as  the  result 
of  his  deductions  it  was  that  Lucy  loved  John 
Frane,  and  his  greatest  fear  was  that  Frane's 
death  would  break  his  daughter's  heart.  But  he 
had  given  no  hint  of  his  knowledge  to  her.  He 
respected  her  secret  as  she  had  once  respected  his. 

The  rubber  tires  spun  softly  along,  the  horses' 
hoofs  clicked  on  the  asphalt  of  Connecticut  Ave- 
nue, while  Lucy,  her  declaration  made,  remained 
silent  and  the  doctor  could  find  no  words.  He  felt 
as  if  the  fair  head  on  his  shoulder  were  a  tribunal 
deciding  his  fate. 

"Daddy,  you  told  me  a  falsehood,"  she  said  at 
last,  "for  she  is  alive — so  terribly  alive !  But  you 
told  it  for  the  same  reason  that  you  have  done 
everything — for  my  good.  I  am  glad  you  did. 
She  taught  me  so  much  about  you.  She  showed  me 
what  a  splendid  fellow  you  were  when  you  were 
young — as  I  always  knew  you  must  have  been — 
and  this  was  quite  the  contrary  effect  from  what 
she  wanted.     She  made  my  heart  bigger.     Now 

336 


The  Cabin  and  the  Girl 

there  will  be  more  room  in  it  for  love  of  you.  Tell 
me,  father,  is  it  wicked — is  it  a  sin  which  should 
make  me  pray  every  night  if  she  is  hateful  to 
me?" 

"No,"  he  answered.  "She  is  dead.  Let  us  still 
think  that.     Shall  we,  madchen  ?" 

"Yes,  and  never  speak  of  her,  and  take  down  the 
portrait;  shall  we?" 

"Yes,"  he  answered.  "And  why  should  we 
stay  in  Washington  any  longer?  Why  shouldn't 
we  travel  more?  Why  shouldn't  we  go  quite 
around  the  world?" 

"Have  we  the  money?"  she  asked.  "Two  such 
dreamers  as  you  and  I  are  likely  to  forget  that, 
father." 

"Yes.  But  I  have  saved  a  little  and  I  get  some- 
thing from  royalties  on  one  of  my  inventions,  and 
it  will  not  be  so  expensive." 

He  made  up  his  mind  that  she  should  soon  know 
how  much  that  little  was;  but  not  to-night — not 
when  they  were  within  a  block  of  the  hotel.  It 
must  be  at  such  a  luncheon  as  they  had  had  in  Paris 
when  he  gave  her  the  pearls.  First  he  would  tell 
her  that  the  pearls  were  real;  then  he  would  lay  a 
list  of  his  securities  before  her  and  explain  how  he 
had  gained  them  in  behalf  of  a  little  bundle  of 
humanity  which  he  had  once  carried  down  the 
stairs  of  a  Parisian  house.     After  that  he  might 

337 


Lucy  of  the  Stars 

spend  as  much  as  he  pleased  in  order  to  make  her 
forget  her  love  for  Frane. 

"Yes,"  she  said,  "I'll  be  ready  to  go  any  time 
after  to-morrow,"  as  she  knew  she  would  if  Arthur 
did  not  come. 

We  need  not  follow  the  doctor's  inscrutable 
mental  processes  further  than  his  happiness  at  find- 
ing that  she  was  still  all  his  as  she  kissed  him  good 
night  and  called  him  the  king  of  fathers. 

Once  in  her  room,  she  looked  again  at  the  gown 
in  the  mirror,  for  she  was  feminine  and  she  loved 
the  gown  and  thanked  it  for  the  part  it  had  played 
in  bringing  Arthur  near  her  for  a  few  sweet  mo- 
ments. Then  she  thought  of  the  one  to  whom 
credit  was  due  and  flew  to  her  writing-table. 

"Enfin,  Monsieur  Celestin, 
J'ai  porte  votre  robe,  enfin, 
Et  on  a  dit  ce  que  vous  avez  dit,  enfin, 
Enfin,  Monsieur  Celestin,' * 

she  began.  This  girl  who  had  pricked  her  finger 
in  order  that  Mrs.  Hodges'  feelings  should  not 
suffer  could  imagine  the  little  man  pirouetting  as 
he  read  the  note,  which  would  bring  more  joy  to 
his  artistic  soul  than  any  number  of  checks.  Mean- 
while, the  ghosts  were  creeping,  creeping,  creeping 
up  till  they  gripped  the  very  piano  keys  on  which 
she  played  her  never-care  songs. 

338 


XXXII 

WORMLEY    CALLS 

WORMLEY  was  a  member  of  Parliament 
now,  and  he  expected  to  be  at  least  a 
baronet  before  he  died.  The  broker's  part  that 
he  had  played  for  the  family  of  Steadley  stood 
for  more  than  one  rung  in  the  ladder  of  an  am- 
bitious man.  He  was  already  in  Washington 
when  Carniston  returned  from  the  West  barely 
in  time  for  the  ball;  and  failing  to  see  him  that 
afternoon  he  went  early  to  the  embassy  the  next 
morning,  where  he  waited  patiently  until  he  was 
shown  up  to  the  earl's  room.  After  some  formal- 
ity in  introducing  the  subject,  he  explained  that  the 
death  of  one  of  the  creditors  had  complicated 
affairs.  The  executors,  it  seemed,  were  disin- 
clined to  see  any  advantage  in  delay  rather  than 
immediate  settlement.  Therefore,  the  estate 
could  count  on  no  longer  grace  than  the  six  months 
originally  accorded  to  the  late  earl. 

"Only  a  month  remains,"  Wormley  explained. 
"We   had   heard   of  your  engagement   to   Miss 

339 


Lucy  of  the  Stars 

Hodges,  who  was  certainly  a  most  excellent  choice 
— combining  health  and  beauty  with  wealth — 
only  to  hear  it  positively  denied.  Then  you  go 
away  on  a  six  weeks'  hunting  trip,  which  I  fear, 
my  lord,  was  a  departure  from  the  spirit  of  the 
arrangement  by  which  we  advanced  the  money." 

Carniston  had  sunk  deep  in  his  chair,  and  he 
was  watching  the  smoke  roll  upward  from  his 
cigarette  while  Wormley  spoke. 

"I've  been  out  where  you  eat  grub  off  the  chuck 
waggon,"  he  said.  "It  costs  little  to  live  and  be  free 
out  there.  Even  if  I  can't  get  a  place  in  the  fac- 
tory, I  can  go  West." 

"Factory!" 

"Yes,  I  have  about  made  up  my  mind,  with  all 
thanks  for  your  trouble  on  my  behalf,  to  marry 
a  poor  girl  that  I  love.  There's  still  room  in  the 
world  to  do  such  a  thing.     Odd,  isn't  it?" 

As  Wormley  told  his  wife  over  his  best  port 
the  night  after  his  return,  his  father  had  drilled 
it  into  him  as  a  boy  that  London  was  a  biggish 
town  and  never  to  lose  his  head. 

"Lord  Carniston,  let  us  reason."  He  compli- 
mented himself  to  Mrs.  Wormley  on  the  self- 
control,  the  respect,  and  the  firmness  of  this  intro- 
duction. Then,  as  he  explained  to  her,  he  appealed 
to  sentiment  and  affection,  "because,"  as  he  con- 
cluded,   "both  must  be  prominent  qualities  in   a 

340 


Wormley  Calls 


young  man  who  wanted  to  marry  for  love  and 
give  up  Burbridge  for  a  chuck  waggon." 

Wormley  made  Carniston  see  the  ever-fresh 
green  of  an  English  lawn;  he  made  him  feel  the 
soft  thickness  of  English  turf  under  his  feet;  he 
took  him  through  the  rooms  of  Burbridge,  end- 
ing with  the  dining-room,  where  hung  the  heads  of 
the  beasts  which  the  hunter  had  killed.  He  re- 
called the  six  earls  who  had  gone  before  and  his 
father's  sacrifice,  the  honour  and  responsibility  of 
an  English  title,  and  the  villagers  whose  welfare 
was  his  trust.  Could  the  heir  throw  up  the  estate 
when  he  was  their  debtor?  Would  he  turn  away 
the  loyal  old  servants? 

Carniston  sank  deeper  in  his  chair,  seeing  only 
the  smoke  from  his  cigarette. 

"Besides,"  said  Wormley,  "being  a  man  of 
action,  if  I  may  so  allude  to  myself,  and  being 
familiar  in  detail  with  the  affairs  of  a  family  which 
I  am  bold  to  say  I  have  served  faithfully  and,  I 
hope,  wisely,  I  undertook  yesterday  to  go  in  per- 
son to  Mrs.  Hodges,  whom  I  found  to  be  an 
excellent  business  woman.  Although  at  the  time 
she  was  uncertain  of  the  state  of  her  daughter's 
mind,  it  seemed,  later  I  received  a  telephone  mes- 
sage from  her  in  the  light  of  which  this  announce- 
ment of  yours — when  I  anticipated  that  I  had 
only  to  ask  you  to  hasten  the  performance  of  the 

34i 


Lucy  of  the  Stars 

ceremony  already  arranged — comes — comes,  I 
must  say,  as  a  bolt  out  of  the  blue.  Is  it  possible 
that  your  reference  to  the  girl's  poverty  is  a — a 
joke?  For  I  assure  you,  my  lord,  Mrs.  Hodges 
told  me  over  the  'phone  that  her  daughter  had 
said  that  she  was  engaged  to  you." 

So  Geraldine  had.  When  she  surprised  the 
maternal  heart  with  the  announcement  she  avoided 
embraces;  and  she  made  a  reservation. 

"You'll  be  happy  here  in  Washington,"  she 
said;  "popular  with  the  Benders  as  the  mother  of 
an  English  countess.  Father  wanted  you  to  be 
happy.  But  I  think,  too,  that  he  wanted  me  to 
suffer  as  little  as  possible.  So  I  go  with  the  under- 
standing that  you  will  not  visit  us  for  more  than 
a  month  a  year.  The  wedding  is  to  be  quiet  and 
in  England.  No ! — not  here  where  Lin  and  Fanny 
would  come." 

Mrs.  Hodges  was  in  the  mood  to  make  conces- 
sions of  detail  in  order  to  gain  the  main  point. 

"Father  said  that  you  always  won,  mother," 
Geraldine  added.     "You  win  this  time." 

She  needed  John  Frane  to  bring  out  the  best  in 
her  character.  She  could  no  longer  soothe  her 
heart  with  thought  of  him.  Washington  had 
become  unbearable  to  her.  A  girl  must  marry 
some  time;  and  a  girl  may  like  peace.    If  this  does 

342 


Wormley  Calls 


not  explain  her  action,  then  one  can  only  say  that 
she  was  Geraldine. 

Lucy  had  put  on  the  Celestin  afternoon  gown 
and  the  piano  was  open  if  it  were  needed  to  play 
some  of  the  new  and  merry  never-cares  which  had 
flitted  through  her  mind.  But  Arthur  did  not 
come.  She  and  her  father  had  tea  alone;  and 
after  his  second  cup,  which  she  poured  holding 
the  pot  with  all  her  strength  lest  he  should  see  her 
tremble,  he  asked  her  for  just  one  song.  She  sang 
him  the  only  thing  that  was  in  her  heart,  a  verse 
from  de  Musset  which  she  had  set  to  music: 

•«  'Quand  j'ai  traverse  la  vallee, 

Un  oiseau  chantait  sur  son  nid. 
Ses  petits,  sa  chere  couvee, 

Venaient  de  mourir  dans  la  nuit. 
Cependant  il  chantait  l'aurore: 

O  ma  Muse!  ne  pleurez-pas. 
A  qui  perd  tout  Dieu  reste  encore, 

Dieu  la-haut,  Tespoir  ici-bas.*  " 

Yet  she  who  could  draw  on  her  futures  to  play 
the  game  for  the  moment  paid  her  farewell  calls 
that  very  afternoon;  and  the  next  day  the  von 
Kars  left  Washington  to  take  a  steamer  for  the 
Mediterranean.  .  .  .  The  luncheon  hour  came 
in  the  France  her  father  loved  so  well  when  he 
yielded  a  miser's  secret;  and  she,  praying  then  to 

343 


Lucy  of  the  Stars 

be  an  actress  for  his  sake,  sang  with  delight  and 
kissed  his  forehead.  ...  In  England  there  is  a 
countess,  beautiful  and  serene,  and  an  earl,  known 
not  as  the  "amiable" — no,  not  quite — but  as  the 
"kindly"  Carniston.  This  pair  never  travel  in 
their  motor  car  with  the  back  seats  empty.  They 
knew  in  the  essential  of  its  ending  the  story  of  a 
one-time  soldier  of  fortune,  seeking  with  the 
change  of  season  the  fair  places  of  the  East  and 
West  for  his  daughter's  health,  who  when  he  was 
one  day  left  alone  in  the  world  asked  himself  the 
question,  "What  is  the  good  of  all  my  money 
now?" 


THE    END 


344 


BOOKS  BY  FREDERICK  PALMER 

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